The Creation of a Dark Witch
by Dany Slytherin
Summary: For Tom Riddle, mudbloods aren't more than a waste of magic. However, Megan proves him wrong when the first time they meet she accidentally makes him a new horcrux and look sheepish about it. Very AU. Fem!Harry.
1. Prologue

Megan Peterson was an odd kid. Mrs Peterson didn't know if what creeped her out was the child's unnerving green eyes or the messy hair that would never settle down. Maybe it was the bored way she looked at people or it was how all the kids seemed to be scared of her.

The only thing the woman knew was that the child was not normal and had never been. She couldn't remember how Megan had ended up in the orphanage, but secretly wished for the girl to leave soon. If only there was someone willing to adopt the kid, a lot of the woman's problems would be solved.

"It's a boarding school, you say?" she asked the handsome man in strange clothes.

"Yes ma'am." He answered politely. "She would be there for the entire school year, save for the summer."

"Even at holidays?" her tone was a bit hopeful, but she wished the man didn't realize it.

"If she wishes she can come back at the holidays, but we offer the opportunity of staying." His tone was bored, but his face was still very pleasing.

"We can't afford it." It was obvious, but she wanted to make sure he knew it.

"We have a fund for the students who can't pay." He explained and a big smile appeared in the female's face.

"Would you like to talk to her?" The woman said a bit too eagerly.

It was happening; she was finally getting rid of the devil's spawn.

* * *

><p>Tom Marvolo Riddle was uncomfortable to say the least. He hated orphanages with all his being, but he was not a man to neglect his duties as Deputy Headmaster over silly memories or disgusting muggles.<p>

The muggle woman had been too eager to get rid of the girl and Tom didn't know if it was because she had way too many kids to take care of or if she wanted to be free of that child in particular. Knowing how much muggles hated anything they considered different, it was probably the late.

Mrs Peterson led him to a room and he was a bit taken aback by the wild haired girl who opened the door. She was very small and looked to be no older than nine, but what drew his attention were her big and cold green eyes. She looked at him suspiciously first and then turned her look to the older lady.

"Another priest?" the cold tone felt strange in her natural sweet voice.

"He's not a priest, girl." The woman scolded, her voice sending some kind of warning. "He's here to talk to you."

Tom scanned the tiny room and the only piece of furnishing he found was a small bed and an old dresser, over the bed there was a window with cells in it. The professor frowned.

"She has jumped out of the window multiple times." The old lady explained quietly when she realized what he was staring at. The girl snorted and he just nodded his head. "Well, I'll let you talk to her."

With a last glace at the tall man and the little girl, Mrs Peterson went downstairs.

The girl stared at him curiously. Her big eyes seemed to wonder if he was dangerous or not and her body blocked his entry to her room.

"Who are you?" she demanded not caring if her voice was high pitched or if he was twice and a half her size.

"I'm Tom Marvolo Riddle, Deputy Headmaster of Hogwarts." He told her.

"Hog what?"

"Hogwarts. A school of witchcraft and wizardry." He explained. "I'm here to offer you a place in there, Miss Peterson."

He was expecting a look of surprise or disbelief from the girl, but what met him was pure amusement and a chuckle.

"I was wondering when Mrs Peterson would try to send me to a house for the crazy." She told him and her statement made him remember himself talking to the old fool, but while he had been full of hatred at the time this girl just seemed amused.

"Hogwarts is not an asylum, Miss Peterson." He told her impatiently. "As I said before it is a school for witches and wizards.

She stepped into her tiny room and he followed her.

"Of course it is." The girl said as she sat at her bed. The gap between their heights seemed even bigger so he decided to take a sit himself. The mattress was thinner than it looked.

"Do you sometimes do things only you can do and can't explain how they happen?" the teacher asked surprisingly kind.

"Like what?"

"Like magical things." He tried to elaborate, just to fail miserably at it.

"Magic doesn't exist, mister Riddle. Ask Mrs Peterson and she will tell you how magicians do their tricks, did you know that they put the rabbit into the hat before they begin the show?" the dark wizard lost his words for some seconds, wondering how the mud blood in front of him could be so sure of herself for someone so little. "Shocking, I know." The girl smiled at him in what must have been sympathy and he shook his head slightly to regain his total mind before she decided to pat his back reassuring.

"I was talking about real magic, Miss Peterson, not illusion. Real magic is when you want something to happen real badly and suddenly they happen without you or anyone doing anything about it." He explained it better this time.

"Oh, that must be cool." She sighed.

What that bloody mud blood meant with _that must be cool_? He was certain that the girl was magical, hell he could feel her magic within ten foot of distance. Surely she must have done some accidental magic by now.

"Have you never done something strange that may have scared you or people around you, like making something fluctuate, your hair grows or hurt someone?" he add the last because if she was even a bit like he had been at her age that was very probable.

He watched the color drain from the muggleborn's face as she went rigid.

"Yeah, and it provided me some exorcisms." The dark haired girl said bitterly. "I'm not possessed."

"This isn't possession, Miss Peterson. It's called magic." He had never met a mud blood so hard to convincing of the existence of magic. Usually they were very excited to the thought of having an entire society like them, but not this one. The wizard was starting to get angry with the dark haired girl.

"STOP LYING TO ME." She screamed and suddenly the room got cold, real cold.

Tom could fell the raw magic around them, it reminded him of pure dark magic, but it wasn't quite it. It was beautiful, strong and alluring, but at the same time it was dangerous and scary. He could almost taste the flashes of magic that emanated from the girl, and the only times he witnessed something likely that was when he performed soul magic.

He searched for the girl's eyes and found that they were actually glowing.

"What the…"

It was the last thing he managed to say before a horrible, but familiar pain of having his soul shattered engulfed him.

* * *

><p><strong><em>Hello there!<em>**

**_So, this is my first fic and I just started it because this idea would not leave my head._**

**_Tell me what you think!_**

**_*I really need a beta, so if anyone is interested please pm me._**


	2. The Creation of a Horcrux

It had taken some time for Megan to calm down. It had taken even more time for the happenings to sink in and finally, it had taken quite some time for the girl realise the amount of trouble she was in. Her bets were on at least two months in the cupboard and a visit of another priest. She looked down at the self-proclaimed wizard to notice he was still breathing and sighed heavily, maybe it would be just one month at the cupboard then.

In her defence, the guy was lying to her constantly and calling her Miss Peterson. She hated being called Miss Peterson; it reminded her of how little she knew about herself. Most of kids from the orphanage had their own last names, like Richard and Marie Hudson, whose parents had died in a car crash and they ended up there, or even Bill Kuhn, whose mother had left him and a note with his name on it in the front of the building. Then there was her, she had no idea how she ended up in the orphanage, sometimes she thought that even Mrs Peterson didn't know. Megan had been there as long as everybody remembered and it pissed her off.

At least she was feeling better somehow, even with a strange pain in her forehead.

"What the hell did you do, brat?" the blue eyed guy had taken advantage of her being lost in thoughts and now stood in front of her with a stick in his hand.

His face was full of hatred and she could see shades of red in his dark blue eyes. It would have been a scary image if it wasn't for the stick. She smiled at him sheepishly.

"_**If I tell you honestly that I don't know, do you agree to not tell the old hag?**_" Megan said in a voice she hoped would sound innocent. He just glared at her, his eyes widening the slightest.

"What did you say?"

"_**I asked for your kindness, sir. Could you please not tell Mrs Peterson**_?" she tried again, more polite this time. Her voice sounded strange to her ears and her tongue tickled.

"Stupid, foolish old man." The pseudo wizard murmured to himself as he passed a hand through his hair, trying to calm down. "Listen, kid. Have you ever seen a snake?"

Megan snorted. This guy was really weird and bipolar, she was even surer that he belonged to a house for the crazy now.

"_**Yeah, in a zoo. Why?**_"

"And did you talk to it?"

Megan remembered how boring reptiles in general were. She had actually tried to talk to the animal, but all it did was sleep. Bears, on the other hand, were much cooler.

"I'm going to kill him." Mr Riddle seemed to have somehow guessed her answer without her voicing it and was now walking from side to other.

She sat at her bed again despite the man's murderous look.

"Come girl. Take my arm and don't let go." His voice was low, but dangerous, so she did as told.

* * *

><p>"<em><strong>What the hell was that?<strong>_" Megan asked once they landed in the middle of nothing. All she could see was grass, but there were the lines of a forest in the distance.

"_**It's called **__**Apparition, Miss Peterson. Now come.**_" He opened the gate and started walking without looking back to see if she was following.

Megan had to take a minute to calm her stomach down.

"_**Wait.**_" The girl shouted when she realised she was a good amount behind. He stopped and looked at her.

"_**I said come.**_" She didn't need a second warn and ran towards the man. He waited until she was beside him to start walking again.

"_**So, where are we going?**_" the dark haired girl was almost running to keep pace with the grown man.

"_**A friend's house.**_" She stopped walking immediately.

"_**I'm not going with you.**_" Megan told him determined.

"_**For the tenth time Miss Peterson, I'm not taking you to an asylum.**_" Tom glared at her. "_**Now move.**_"

"_**Second.**_" She murmured, but started walking again.

"_**What?**_" He paused to look down at her.

"_**It was the second time you told me.**_" The girl explained sheepishly. Tom sighed.

"_**Keep walking, we're almost there.**_"

Ten minutes later Megan couldn't stand it anymore. Her lungs hurt and the wizard in front of her didn't seem to be planning to slow down any minute. The girl took one more step and collapsed in the ground.

"_**I can't take it anymore.**_" She cried out and her voice came out as a hiss.

"_**We are almost there, five minutes at most.**_" He looked back at her.

"_**Well, I can't take one more second of walking, let alone five minutes.**_" Megan was now sitting in the grass breathless, her head between her knees.

"_**Stop whining and get up, Miss Peterson.**_" He hissed at her and she flinched slightly. "You've wasted enough of my time already."

"_**What part of the 'I can't take it anymore' did you not understand?**_"

"The part where you're being a brat._** Now get up and walk.**_" He started walking again, but she remained sat.

"_**What will I gain with it?**_"

"Nothing."

"_**If I don't gain anything with it then you can resume your walk alone, as I'm not moving my feet one inch.**_" She smiled sweetly at him and he cursed under his breath.

"What do you want?" His voice was low and deadly. His dark blue eyes showed so much hatred towards her the she flinched.

"_**Ice-cream.**_" She grinned, despise of the murderer look he was throwing at her. _**"I want lots of ice-cream.**_"

* * *

><p>Regulus Black was once a great and important wizard. He had been powerful and would have the world in his hand if it wasn't for his lack of personality and discernment when young. He remembered bitterly how he used to think his brother was a fool for not following his family tradition of being dark, and now he kind of wished he shared his brother's beliefs instead of his parents'. There was a time when the only future Regulus saw for himself was with Grindelwald, but he had managed to fuck it up, actually, he had managed to fuck his entire life up and now searched for redemption.<p>

He had been smart enough to discover his former master's secret, but had been a fool when it came to protect his family. When Grindelwald found out Regulus knew about his horcruxes he ordered that all his Black followers were murdered. His mother and father, instead of running away with him, decided to go beg mercy and ended up dead.

Regulus would be dead too if it wasn't for Tom Riddle. He met the older wizard when he was hiding from Grindelwald in Albania. Long story short, Riddle found out he knew Grindelwald's secret to immortality and tortured him and his companion to get answers. Surprisingly, Tom didn't kill any of them. Instead, he helped them hide in exchange of doing him some _services_.

Black had not been expecting someone to ponder on his door. There were only three people who knew about the hideout and could get pass through the wards, two of them were in it at the moment and the other one thought himself too important to go there himself to talk to them.

He stopped eating his poor excuse for lunch and went to the door slowly, suspicion taking over him.

"Is it night outside?" Regulus asked softly to the door.

"Only for black birds." A low and smooth voice answered back. Regulus snorted slightly and opened the door.

The wind hit his face, but he didn't care much. Tom was using his usual blank face that pissed him off so badly, but there was something unusual with him: a little girl. Regulus's eyes widened a bit when he saw her, his brain automatically thinking of rituals the older wizard would want to perform using the girl.

"That's not what I want." Riddle had that irritating habit of using legilimency on him all the time. Regulus frowned and tried to raise up occlumency walls even knowing they were weak to the other man.

"Shhh." The girl hissed looking at him, big and unnerving green eyes met his. A shiver went through his spine due to the sound.

"Don't talk." Riddle had incredible kind ways with kids, only not.

The girl swallowed and frowned, her face showed that she was wondering the consequences of not obeying. With a sigh she decided to keep her mouth shut.

"Why are you here? We haven't disarmed all the curses yet, last time we tried half of Lucy's body ended up burned." He spit.

"I'm sure that if you were more careful it wouldn't have happened." Tom smirked as he sat, or rather jumped, unceremoniously in the couch. "That's not why I'm here, though. I have more urgent business to take care with you."

"So talk, I don't live just to please you, as you may think." He was still standing in the small space between the door and the couch, but move slightly so the girl could get more into the house.

She stared at him for some seconds until she decided to sit beside Riddle, her breath a little uneven as if she was very tired.

"You may not live just to please me, but it would be good for you to remember why you and your little mudblood are still alive." His tone was calm, but deadly. "But enough of that, I'm here because of a _problem_ with the girl."

"What kind of problem?"

"A _soul _problem."

Tom told Regulus all that had happened that morning. He had just killed a disgusting traitor in the ritual to make his last horcrux, a small part of his soul was slowly fracturing and would be ready to be transferred to something in a couple of hours as usual. He then had went to that bloody orphanage to fulfil his duties as Deputy Headmaster and the little mudblood had used such dark magic on him that he passed out of exhaustion.

When he woke up all he saw was the girl stuck in her thoughts with a light bolt scar in her forehead that hurt them both when he touched it and to his horror he felt that the seventh part of his soul wasn't there anymore. When the brat started speaking parseltongue he had a horrible theory in his head and decided to seek the help of the only person who knew his secret, the Black traitor.

They had cast some spells to verify his theory and to his mortification he was right.

A part of Tom Riddle's soul was in a filth _mudblood_.

"It's not right." Tom murmured looking at the dark haired mudblood who slept at the couch due to some spells and also because Tom couldn't look into her disgusting eyes anymore.

The house around them was a huge mess due to the dark wizard's terrible mood.

"You could kill her." Regulus offered and flinched when dark blue eyes filled with hate looked at him.

"And lose the part of my soul that is inside her?" His voice was even more deadly than usual, something Regulus didn't thought was possible.

He flinched again.

"Are you really sure that you can't regret it?" Lucy asked as she entered the small living room with a tea tray in her hands. Both men looked at her in surprise, the blond woman rarely spoke in Tom's presence.

"I would have to regret making the horcrux _and_ killing that filth traitor." He sighed. "_I_ didn't _make_ the horcrux myself to regret it and killing that bastard is the last thing I could regret right now."

Tom sipped the tea Lucy gave to him and sighed one more time.

"I guess I have only one option." He said and Regulus and Lucy looked at him. "I need to keep the girl alive until we find another way."

Tom couldn't believe it, he would have to protect the brat, after all a piece of his soul was inside the _filth mudblood._

* * *

><p>If Megan had to compress her morning in one word it would be crazy. First of all a very strange and rude man visited her and proclaimed that she and he were wizards. She didn't believe it at first and was sure it was only a plot of Mrs Peterson to send her to a house for the crazy. But then he had teleported her to an immense field that never ended and forced her to walk all of it. After that they entered a very small house inside the woods and she met another strange looking man, but at least less terrifying, and fell into sleep in the middle of their conversation. When she woke up she found a breath-taking woman staring at her with wondering eyes, who presented herself as Lucy and gave Megan awesome tea.<p>

She had a suspicion that the weirdness of the day hadn't finished yet.

"This is delicious." She offered the blonde lady who was sitting at her side in the strangely comfortable couch.

The room was very quiet and the silence was suffocating her. She was used to it, but when there were adults looking at her it would mean just one thing: trouble. And at the time there were three, two of them with scary look in their faces.

"Finish it quickly, we have places to go." The self-proclaimed wizard told her rudely, to her _surprise._

She took a biscuit from the tray in front of her just to mess with him. And it was delicious too. She looked at Lucy and grinned.

"These are great too." She offered and it came out strangely from her mouth. Never in her life she had praised someone or even said something genuinely nice, but there was something about this Lucy that enchanted her.

Lucy and the other owner of the house looked uncomfortable. She just grinned again at the rude guy, knowing he was the source of their uncomfortableness. He, on the other hand, seemed that had had enough.

"Hurry up brat, or I'll choke you with those biscuits." The threat seemed so real that it sent shivers over her spine. It reminded her of Mrs Peterson threating her with the cupboard, but the sensation was even worse.

Megan got up and took three more biscuits from the tray, just to piss him off. Her specialty was to make people angry, after all.

"Thanks for the hospitality Lucy." She grinned again, frowning inside at her strangeness towards the woman. "Strange man." She bowed slightly at the dark eyed man.

"It's Regulus." He told her and she nodded her head at him.

"I'll talk to you when you break all those curses." Rude guy told the couple (at least she assumed) and they left the house.

Megan growled when she realized she would have to walk that entire field _again_.

"Tom, isn't it?" she asked to pass the time.

"It's professor Riddle for you." His tone was monotonous, rude _and_ deadly at the same time.

"Okay…" she picked up a sunflower close to her feet. The flower wasn't really pretty and she decided to rip its petals. "Where are we going?"

"To get your school supplies." He looked down at the flower in her hand and wrinkled his nose.

"And my ice-cream, I believe?" she smirked.

"Just walk."

* * *

><p>Diagon Alley was nothing but awesome. It was magical and wonderful and just great.<p>

The first place they entered was a shop called Flourish and Blotts where the shelves were stacked to the ceiling with books as large as paving stones bound in leather; books the size of postage stamps in covers of silk; books full of peculiar symbols and a few books with nothing in them at all. Megan was really enchanted with the place, but when she heard professor Riddle asking for the first year kit she realized that she didn't have any money.

"Professor Riddle" she whispered his name when the seller was too busy trying to attend everybody at the shop.

"What?" The wizard looked at her with disdain.

"I don't have any money." She told him sheepishly, her eyes downcast.

"Don't be silly, girl. Hogwarts has a fund for students who can't pay for their school supplies." He told her and she felt the lump in her throat disappear. "Now hold these."

He gave her a bag that even being full of books didn't weight more than a feather and imagined that it must had to do with something Rude Guy did with his stick.

They went to a few shops, like the Apothecary, which was fascinating enough to make up for its horrible smell. Megan realized that professor Riddle bought everything new to her and it bothered her a bit when she realized that she had never had something new until now. She smiled a little when she passed a hand through one of her new books it was a very good feeling, having something just yours, that had never belonged to anybody before.

They stopped in front of a clothes shop called Madame Malkin's Robes for All Occasions and she entered it behind the older man.

"Hello darlings, how can I help you?" a slightly over weighted woman asked as soon as they entered the shop and Megan automatically looked over to the professor for him to speak up.

"I'll have the robes and everything else in the first year list, please." Riddle said. "I'll pay now."

"Okay, that'll be twenty galleons and thirteen sickles, sir." The woman said and Megan wondered if it was a lot of money of not. The wizard money really confused her.

Riddle paid without saying another word.

"Miss Peterson, I'll go to Gringotts, the wizard bank, while you try on the robes. If I'm not back when you're done you just wait for me, okay?" His eyes were filled with less hatred and more tediousness now. Megan just nodded as his tone didn't leave room for argument.

"Come darling, there's a boy being measured too, so go and step into that tool besides him.

Megan snorted at the sight of a slightly taller boy, who had auburn hair. She couldn't help it as that was just her normal reaction to kids. Unhappily, he had an entire different approach to her.

When she stepped into the stool he grinned at her and started conversation. Some ghost measuring tape started to measure her and she let a little squeal out.

"Hogwarts too?" He sounded excited, but she still had a hard time picturing Hogwarts as a school and not as an asylum.

Megan just nodded and he grinned even more, if possible. She was suspicious of the boy. He was strange, every kid she knew disliked her immediately because of her weirdness, but he was smiling and trying to talk to her. Maybe every person of this Wizard World were weird too, if that was true, Megan would enjoy it.

"Are you muggleborn? Because I don't think I remember meeting you and you certainly doesn't look like you belong to a dark family." He asked her sympathetically.

She scowled a bit. Everybody thought she had a nice face when they met her. There were a lot of couples who would get interested in adopting her when she was a bit younger because of her sweet looking face, but then they heard what people said about her, or even after the talked to her a bit, they seemed to change their minds.

So she scowled and smiled, a bit uncertain if she considered it a compliment or not.

"I don't know what a muggleborn is." She told him.

"It's a wizard or witch who is a child of muggles." He explained, when he saw that she didn't know what a muggle was he hushed to explain to her. "Muggles are people without magic." He looked at her again, a bit of mischief in his hazel eyes. "Yeah, definitely a muggleborn."

"I suppose I am." She answered him. Actually she didn't know for sure, but if her parents were magical she certainly would not end up in that orphanage, right?

"My mom's a muggleborn too." The boy kept talking. "She's great."

Megan smiled lightly and the measure tape stopped to work on her, suddenly falling into the floor.

"So, in what house do you think you'll be? I wanna be in Gryffindor, that's the greatest one. My entire family was in there, but I guess Ravenclaw wouldn't be so bad. I will leave school if I get sorted into Slytherin, though, because there are just evil snakes there, I know it's true because my dad and godfather always say it." The boy kept talking to her, but the girl didn't know what he was talking about.

"Either way, I'm Brandon Potter." The boy offered his hand and Megan took it.

"Megan Peterson."

"What's Gryffindork?" she asked professor Riddle when they were in their way to buy Megan a stick. The wizard smirked, seeming to find the word amusing.

"You mean Gryffindor." He told her, the smirk still in place. "It's one of the four house of Hogwarts." She kept looking at him, as if asking for him to continue so he did. "Hogwarts students are divided into four houses: Gryffindor, Hufflepluff, Ravenclaw and Slytherin. It's chosen based on personality."

"Did you study in Hogwarts?" she asked and he nodded. "Which house were yours?"

"Slytherin." He said it with such a pride that Megan frowned.

"The house of the evil snakes." She teased and the wizard glared at her.

"Who told you that?"

"A boy in the clothes' shop"

"Well he is an idiot I tell you, I bet he said the best one was Gryffindor." Megan nodded, agreeing. "Don't believe in him. Gryffindors are stupid little brats, but I guess you'll see for yourself, come in."

Riddled led her into a tiny shop that read Ollivander's Wand Shop. She supposed she would finally get her stick then, which would be surely be awesome.

It wasn't awesome at all.

Two hours later Ollivander's shop was all shattered and professor Riddle stared at the duet in the middle of the shop impatiently.

"I'll take this one." Megan told the old man, referring to a wand that vibrated continuously in her hand. At least it didn't destroy something.

"No, no, no, Miss Peterson. I can't let you have a wand that didn't choose you." Ollivander tried to snatch the wand out of the girl's hand, but her grip on it was too strong.

"It doesn't matter, because _I_ chose _it_." She told him petulantly, holding the stick as if her life depended on it.

"Stop his nonsense, brat." Riddled chastised her, he was noticeably annoyed with the wait.

"Could it be?" Ollivander wondered looking from Tom to Megan and from Megan to Tom. "Perhaps it could. Wait a bit, Miss Peterson."

Ollivander went to the shelves of wands and Megan took this opportunity to send a nasty glare towards Riddle, just for the sake of it. The glare he send back were ten times worse. So the only thing she could do was to stick her tongue out at him.

"Here, Miss Peterson, try this one." He gave another stick at her.

When she took it in her hand her entire body rejoiced. She was involved in such nice warmness and black and golden sparks left the wand at her hand.

She was truly happy.

"The core of this wand is a phoenix feather." Ollivander began and it seemed to get Riddle's attention because his bored eyes suddenly went to the old guy's face. The old man realised it and winked at the other wizard. "This special phoenix only gave two feathers and I made two wands from them. Imagine my happiness when I have these two brother wands with me today, each one of them with a rightful owner."

Megan eyes widened when she saw professor Riddle gently petting his wand.

"Is my wand professor's Riddle wand's brother?" The girl asked shyly. Ollivander just nodded and smiled.

"That'll be thirteen galleons."

Riddled paid him with a sour look in his face, but that didn't worry Megan, as it was the only look he had.

"I think we're done here, Miss Peterson." The teacher told her relieved.

"Now we get ice-cream." She grinned.

**So that's it people, I apologize for my extremely long delay, but these past months were the last ones of my school year, so I had a lot of things to do. (Just have eighteen subjects)**

**I know my writing skill sucks and would really appreciate if someone could be my beta. **** Pretty please?**

**I hope you guys like it and I know it's really confusing at the moment, but I promise everything will be explained.**

**I'll try to update faster these months I'm on my holydays, but can't promise much. At least two chapters a month I think I can make.**

**So that's it and thanks for reading. :D **


	3. The Creation of a Baby Snake

Life in the Magical World hadn't been easy until recently. Ten years ago Grindelwald was still in power and the only place that didn't succumbed to him was Hogwarts. At least Albus Dumbledore could be proud of this one thing.

For some time it had been hell only for Muggles. Magic less people were killed and turned into slaves every day. Fortunately for the muggleborns, Grindelwald thought that magical people were superior to those who didn't have it, so they weren't killed, just ripped from their families and forced into wizard shelters, sometimes with families and sometimes into orphanages.

However, Grindelwald didn't stop there. The power made him a ruthless man and started wars with Light wizards and witches who refused to follow him and agree with his methods. The greater good long forgotten, Gellert just wanted one thing: _power_.

To not lose the dark families support he started killing all the muggleborns who reached the age of eleven, thereby preventing them of getting education. It lead to even more conflicts and further separation of the dark and light families.

Albus became the leader of the Light while Grindelwald continued as the leader of the Dark.

The Light witches and wizards closed every magical orphanage and sent the kids to their muggle parents between the years of 1960 and 1970 and because of that, Grindelwald stopped concentrating his forces on muggles and muggleborns to start a civil war.

The magical World, mainly the Magical Britain, lost lots of families and reduced its size drastically due to the war.

Dumbledore would never forget the Halloween of 1981, ten years ago, when he decided to seek Gellert to see if he could put some sense into his mind. What he found in his former friend's chambers surprised him and the events of that night would never leave his head.

That day was known as the day Light won over Dark and Dumbledore got rid of Grindelwald for good. People were happy and most wizards and witches wanted Dumbledore as Minister of Magic, but he refused, not trusting himself with power.

The years passed and lots of things happened. The Grindelwald's followers were hunted down and everyone who confessed were sent to Azkaban. However, there were some powerful families who claimed to be under the Imperius Curse and were left unpunished. Nevertheless these past ten were the best the Magical World had in a long time.

* * *

><p>Richard was a thirteen year old boy whose favourite hobby was to pick on Megan. He and his gang – that had four boys from ten to thirteen years old – loved to give the girl a hard time about her hair – that was a nest – or her size, which was very small for someone her age, but his favourite topic was her freakiness.<p>

"Hey freak." Richard greeted Megan when she entered the dining room. "Heard you got a scholarship to a school for crazy kids."

It was one week after professor Riddle's visit and by that time, everybody knew the freak girl was going to a boarding school. Everyone was so happy that Megan heard they were planning to throw a party the day she left. It didn't affect her much, she was even happier than them. Just thinking of spending months without looking at their ugly faces gave Megan butterflies in her stomach.

_The joy_.

"I'm talking to you." Richard grabbed her upper arm when she took a plate of porridge and sat down without paying him any attention.

"What do you want, Richard?" she asked bored. Their little quarrel was getting old and tedious.

"I want to know how you're feeling." He smirked and she grimaced at the sight of his crooked teeth so near her. "You know, going to an asylum and all."

"Actually, I'm feeling great." She smiled sweetly at him. "Just the thought of not having to see your ugly face for months makes me really happy. To say the truth, I'm starting to understand why your mother was so eager to abandon you."

The older boy's face twitched and he twisted her arm with so much force that tears formed in her eyes. She looked right into his brown eyes and wished with all her strength that he felt pain.

Richard let her arm go quickly, his face scowling with pain.

"You _bitch_." He hissed and Megan could see that the hand which was holding her arm was now very reddish and burnt.

The teenager boy grabbed both her arms and squeezed hard.

"You're a freak, did you know that?" he yelled at the exactly time Mrs Peterson chose to enter the room.

"What's going on here?" She asked sternly.

"This freak burned me." Richard let Megan's arms go so he could show the woman his hand.

Megan sighed, knowing very much what waited for her.

"Wait for me in the cupboard, Megan. I'll have my breakfast and then we'll have a little chat." The woman's tone was bored, but the girl knew there was a threat there.

She took one more spoonful of her porridge and got up from the bench.

"Idiot." She whispered to the boy who smirked at her.

When Mrs Peterson had the _little chat_ with her, Megan realized the woman wasn't putting all her strength into it. Maybe it was because they both knew that in a month it would be over.

_One moth_, these two words were the reason of Megan's smile and nothing would take it off her face. Not even new scars in her back.

The rest of the summer had went smoothly. Megan's birthday passed without any happenings as it was just a symbolical date, August fourteenth, which Mrs Peterson declared when she arrived at the orphanage.

The kids left her alone as usual, after the Richard accident they seemed to grow quite afraid of Megan, which was great to her. Mrs Peterson still had doubts if the dark haired girl could be left alone with the other kids without supervision, so the woman also helped her to keep some distance.

When there was just a day left for the first day of September Megan decided to ask Mrs Peterson for a ride to the King's Cross station. It was the only thing to do, even if she hated to talk to the Petersons the girl wouldn't miss her magical school year just out of fear of their reaction.

"Come in." she heard a male voice call after she knocked on the dark wooden door.

Megan frowned and paused for some seconds. The voice sounded like Mr Peterson's and it sent involuntary shivers down her spine. The man almost weren't seen by the orphan kids as it was Mrs Peterson who ran the orphanage, but everybody knew not to mess with him. The little witch had some bad memories involving the man, but she shook her head and forced herself to be brave – even every bone in her body telling her to turn back and wait to speak with the man's wife instead).

The girl took a deep breath and opened the door.

It was a small but tidy office. There was a shelf of books and an armchair against the wall and in the middle, in front of a window, there was a desk where Mr Peterson sat.

"Oh, hello Megan." Mr Peterson was a tall and fat man, who had a horrendous moustache between his nose and mouth. "What can I do for you?"

His tone was sickly sweet and Megan grimaced slightly.

"I was hoping you or Mrs Peterson could give me a ride to King Cross." She used her sweet tone with him. "I don't know if you're aware, but I got a scholarship to a boarding school and the train will leave the station tomorrow."

"Yes, Abigail told me." He chuckled and it was quite weird to hear someone calling Mrs Peterson by her given name. "A school full of freak kids like you."

He stopped and looked at Megan with eyes full of disgust. The girl used all her mental strength to keep looking into his eyes with a blank face. She wanted to rip that moustache off his face _so badly_.

"I'll drive you." The fat man offered her a nasty smirk. "Anything to get rid of _you_."

Megan woke at five o'clock the next morning and was too excited and nervous to go back to sleep. She got up and pulled on some cotton shorts because she didn't want to walk into the station in her witch's robes, if it was all a prank she wouldn't give the crazy people the satisfaction of knowing they tricked her.

Two hours later, Megan's huge, but light-weighted trunk had been loaded into the old car and she and Mr Peterson took off. The ride was a very uncomfortable one, to say the least.

They reached King's Cross at half past ten. Mr Peterson dumped Megan's trunk onto a cart and wheeled it into the station for her. Megan thought this was strange, but then realized it would look weird if people saw a tall man letting a little girl carry an enormous trunk by herself.

"What platform is it?" Mr Peterson asked.

"Platform 9 ¾" she blushed because she was aware that it sounded stupid.

"What?" He looked at her like she had finally gone crazy.

"It's between platforms ten and nine." She retold what professor Riddle said to her a month ago.

"_Freaks._" Mr Peterson growled under his breath but walked to where the girl said. "It's here. What now?"

Megan took her truck from his hand and, with a deep breath, she looked at the man accompanying her.

"Now I see you next summer." She told him and ran towards the barrier between platforms nine and ten.

* * *

><p>A scarlet train was waiting next to a platform packed with people. A sign overhead said Hogwarts Express, eleven O'clock. Mega looked behind her and saw an archway where the barrier had been, with the words Platform Nine and Three-Quarters on it. A wild grin appeared in her face, she had done it.<p>

The first few carriages were already packed with students, some hanging out of the window to talk to their families, some fighting over seats. Megan pushed her cart off down the platform in search of an empty seat.

She passed a round-faced boy who was saying "Gran, I've lost my toad again."

"Oh, Neville." She heard the old woman sigh.

Megan pressed on through the crowd until she found an empty compartment near the end of the train. Her truck was surprisingly easy to get into the compartment because of the stick trick professor Riddle had done in it.

She barely had time to adjust herself on one of the sits when the train began to move. However, the girl was able to find a very comfortable position to take a nap as she had had little sleep the night before.

The dark haired girl closed her eyes and was ready to travel in the land of dreams when the door of the compartment slid open and a redheaded boy came in.

"Anyone sitting here?" he asked, pointing at the seat opposite Megan. "Everywhere else is full."

Megan sighed as she shook her head and the boy sat down.

"I'm Ron Weasley." He offered and Megan sighed again. So much for some peaceful sleep.

"Megan Peterson." She didn't want to be rude, but was hoping the boy wouldn't want to chat.

"Hey, Ron." An auburn-haired boy entered the compartment and Megan realized he was the boy from the clothes' shop.

Both boys had almost the same colour of hair, but the second's was darker.

"Oh, hello. Megan, right?"

The girl nodded but closed her eyes, hoping they would get the message.

"Did you know she's a muggleborn?" The boy from the shop, Brad she thought, asked the redheaded.

"Really? That's cool. How are muggles like?" he sounded very interested.

Megan growled and realized there was no way she was going to get some sleep during the trip. So she sat and opened her eyes.

"They're horrible." She answered. "At least everyone I know is."

"Well, the only muggles I know aren't very nice too." Brad told her. "But my mom is great, as I told you that day."

"Are you cousins or something?" the girl thought funny that she had never met anyone with red hair until now and suddenly she meet two at the same time.

"No, we just have the same colour of hair." It was true. While Ron was tall, had some freckles and blue eyes Brad was smaller, had high cheekbones and hazel eyes.

"Do you guys know a lot of magic already?" she asked a question that was bugging her the entire summer. The girl had went through her books, but couldn't let to think that she would be behind all the kids who grew up in wizards families.

"Not much, most parents don't teach their children magic before they go to Hogwarts." Brad answered her. She nodded, already feeling a bit relieved.

Through conversation she found out that Ron had five older brothers and one little sister and because of the way he talked she soon found out that he had money issues and sympathized with the boy. After all she knew how hard it was to share a house with lots of kids and not having much money.

Brad – who was actually Brandon – was the opposite. He was an only child and Megan could sense that he was quite spoiled. His clothes were all in good state and he had some expensive things, like a golden clock.

"Fred and George are trying to the Quidditch Team this year." Ron started talking to Brad – for her it would always be Brad – after some minutes of silence.

"It's so unfair first years can't be in the team." The smaller boy wined. "My dad and godfather always tell me that when I sing up there's no way I won't join the team."

"What's quidditch again?" Megan asked.

"_No way!_" Brad exclaimed, his face looking like she had just insulted him. "There's _no way_ you don't know what quidditch is."

"Well, I don't live in the Wizard World."

"It's the most amazing game in the world." Ron started and Brad nodded cheerfully.

"There are…" They started to explain the rules of the game to her.

Megan thought it quite stupid, to be honest. However, she just kept listening to the boys and nodding her head, she was afraid of saying what she really thought because they seemed very in love with the game and wouldn't take it too kindly if the girl disdained it.

Around half past twelve there was a great clattering outside in the corridor and a smiling, dimpled woman slid back their door.

"Anything off the cart, dears?" she asked.

Megan, who hadn't any money and wasn't really angry shook her head and Ron's ears went pink and he muttered that he'd brought sandwiches.

Brad, however, went out into the corridor.

When he came back his hands were full of candies and he explained to Megan what Bettie Bott's Every Flavour Beans, Drooble's Best Blowing Gum, Chocolate Frogs. Pumpkin Pasties, Cauldron Cakes, Licorice Wands, and a number of other strange things Megan had never seen in her life were.

Brad dropped the candies in the empty space at her side and told the taller boy and her to get whatever they wanted. Ron went for it, but Megan just shook her head.

"No thanks." She murmured, a bit suspicious of somebody being too nice with her for no reason apparent.

"Come on, at least try a Chocolate Frog." He offered a small package to her and she took it unwilling.

"They're not really frogs, right?" These people were crazy and she expected anything from them.

"No." said Ron. "But see what the card is. I'm missing Agrippa."

"What?"

"Oh, of course, you wouldn't know. Chocolate Frogs have cards, inside them, you know, to collect, famous witches and wizards. I've got about five hundred, but I haven't got Agrippa or Ptolemy."

"Collecting Chocolate Frogs cards are for kids, Ron" Brad teased.

Megan unwrapped her Chocolate Frog and picked up the card. It showed a man's face. He wore half- moon glasses, had a long, crooked nose, and flowing silver hair, beard, and moustache. Underneath the picture was the name Albus Dumbledore.

"I got Dumbledore." said Harry.

"Don't tell me you'd never heard of Dumbledore!" said Brad, opening one frog himself. "Guess who I got, Ron? Ptolemy."

Megan turned over her card and read:

ALBUS DUMBLEDORE

CURRENTLY HEADMASTER OF HOGWARTS

_Considered by many the greatest wizard of modern times, Dumbledore is particularly famous for his defeat of the dark wizard Grindelwald in 1981, for the discovery of the twelve uses of dragon's blood, and his work on alchemy with his partner, Nicolas Flamel. Professor Dumbledore enjoys chamber music and tenpin bowling._

There was a knock on the door of their compartment and the round-faced boy Megan had passed on platform nine and three quarters came in. He looked tearful.

"Sorry," he said "but have you seen a toad at all?"

"You lost your toad again, Neville?" Brad asked and the other boy's ears went pink.

"It's not my fault!" he said indignantly. "He keeps running away from me."

"Maybe he wants a new owner." Megan opined and the round boy gasped loudly.

"Don't listen to her, Neville." Ron reassured and at the same time sent a murderous look towards Megan. "He'll turn up."

"Yes." said the boy miserably. "Well, if you see him..."

He left.

"I don't know if I would be so devastated if I lost Scabbers." Ron said and petted a big and grey rat that sat in his lap.

Megan hadn't seen him until now and couldn't stop herself of envying the small animal while he slept so heavily.

"You still have this rat? My mom wanted to give me an owl for my birthday but I preferred a new broom." Said Brad.

"I tried to turn him yellow yesterday to make him more interesting, but the spell didn't work. I'll show you, look..."

The redheaded boy rummaged around in his trunk and pulled out a very battered-looking wand. It was chipped in places and something white was glinting at the end.

"Unicorn hair's nearly poking out. Anyway…"

The boy did the spell, but nothing happened besides the rat's snoozing getting louder.

"I don't think it worked." Brad pointed out and Ron's ears got pink one more time.

They spent the rest of ride talking about Hogwarts Houses. At the least the boys were. They started rambling about the greatness of Gryffindor and Megan took this opportunity to take her very wanted and needed nap.

* * *

><p>"Look at where you're going, mudblood." Megan saw a blond pretty boy snap at a bushy haired girl when they were waiting to be sorted into the houses.<p>

The green eyed girl didn't know what the word meant, but it was very clear by the disgusting tone of the boy that it was an insult.

"What's a mudblood?" she asked Brad who was discussing what the sorting would be like with Ron – who was certain they would be facing a troll.

The boy looked at her with a bit of pity in his eyes.

"That's how evil people call muggleborns." Megan frowned. "Some pureblood families think they're superior because they have magic in their families for generations, but that's nonsense." Brad assured her and Megan couldn't help but like the boy a bit.

Both boys followed her eyes and saw they were on the blond pretty boy who had insulted the girl.

"Don't mind him, he's a Malfoy." Ron said like it explained a lot of things. "He'll be in Slytherin for sure."

"I bet." Brad agreed. "It would be awesome if the three of us get sorted into Gryffindor, we'll join your brothers and prank the Slytherins every day." The look in the boy's eyes was so excited that Megan thought he would start drooling any moment.

"I don't want to have anything to do with Fred and George." Ron grumbled.

"Oh, I do!" the hazel eyed boy grinned madly. "My father made me promise to prank professor Snape a lot and Sirius told me to not go easy on Riddle."

"For what I heard of both of them you'll be dead in a week." Ron murmured and shuddered at Brad's zippy look.

* * *

><p>Megan knew she was screwed the moment the word <em>Slytherin<em> left the hat's mouth.

It hadn't even touched her head as it shouted the house she belonged. The girl was a bit insulted to say the truth, she knew her hair was a mess, but it _was _clean.

She wasn't stupid though, she knew the Slytherins wouldn't like her because of her blood and Brad and Ron would resent her for being an evil snake. It didn't bother her much, she was used to people not liking her, but it had been nice being able to talk to the boys without them hating her instantly.

Her assumptions were confirmed when her eyes found Ron's at the Gryffindor table and the boy scowled at her. She just shrugged and paid attention to the headmaster's strange speech and recommendations of staying away from the third floor if they wanted to avoid certain death.

All the thoughts left her head when food appeared in front of her and she caught a glance of roasted beef in front of her. She grinned and filled a plate with it.

_It was amazing. _

"Bloody mudblood." She heard Malfoy murmur looking at her disgusted.

"Did you say something, blondie?" she asked the pretty boy and he seemed both surprised and insulted with the nickname.

"You should learn your place, mudblood." He spat at Megan. The first years that sat near them started paying attention at their conversation and the green eyed girl grinned slightly.

"And where would it be?" she stopped eating her roasted beef to pay full attention at blondie.

"Hufflepluff, at most." He told her smugly and the kids around them snickered.

She smiled again.

"The talking hat seems to think otherwise."

"Well, the Sorting Hat must have gone crazy if he put a mudblood in Slytherin." Some boys mumbled in agreement and two girls giggled.

"Crazy or not, he's the one who dictates the houses where we belong, so I guess you'll have to deal with it, blondie."

Megan was sure the boy was holding himself to not stick his tongue out at her. His face was twisted and red.

"_Mudblood._" He spat as if it declared he had won their little discussion or that there wasn't even one to begin with.

Megan just smiled again and resumed eating her marvellous beef.

* * *

><p>Tom was intrigued with Megan Peterson to say the least. First she takes a part of his soul and becomes a Horcrux of his and then she is sorted into Slytherin. His suspicions were that she wasn't a mudblood. Fools could say whatever they wanted, but everyone who knew a bit of blood magic knew that there were differences between new and old magic in a wizard or witch.<p>

It was true that they were both powerful, but while the first generations of a magic family had rawer magical cores the members of older families had more lapidated ones, which made it very easier to use magic and due to this they were able of becoming more powerful.

He knew about means of discovering her ancestors, but he would need a family tree to test. There was nothing that would spell the name of her family, the only thing he could do was test if she was or wasn't from a certain family.

However, there was a simple ritual he could do with some drops of her blood to see if she had old or new magic and then he would finally know if she was a mudblood or not.

He would do it as soon as he had an opportunity and until then he would just continue to sulk about the soul thing, because he had the damn right to do so.

He observed the green eyed girl as she had an unfriendly talk with the Malfoy heir. He could imagine what they were talking about and it just bothered him a little more. Part of him wished the girl ended up being a mudblood so the similarities with him would stop.

The similarities had been the reason why he paid for her school supplies himself. He had been a poor orphan boy once and had to endure having second handed clothes and books because Hogwarts's fund for that propose wasn't very big.

He'd told himself that he did it because he didn't like the idea of having his horcrux using second handed things and not because the look in the girl's face when she touched her new books was endearing.

He was a Dark Lord in training for Merlin's sake, he didn't thought anything to be _endearing_, let alone a little girl's smile.

"What animal bit you?" Snape, the closest person of friend to Tom, asked when he realized the taller man was wearing a bitter mask.

"You're the one to talk." He murmured as he ate a piece of an acceptable roasted beef.

"I'm always bitter, you, on the other hand, has always been a charmer." His former house mate pointed and Tom sighed.

"There's a mudblood in my House." He answered and it was half the truth, his bad mood was due to her existence, after all.

Albus looked at him with sour eyes. He must had heard the word Tom used to describe the girl, but the younger wizard didn't care much. The old fool knew about Riddle's visions of the world, but didn't meddle into his life much. _There was _a reason he gave the post of Defence Against the Dark Arts teacher to Tom, after all.

"It's quite intriguing to say the least." The Potions Master confessed. "It's been a while since we've seen a muggleborn into Slytherin." His smirk didn't please Tom very much.

"Don't get me started." He said bitterly.

"Wasn't planning to do so."

* * *

><p>Tracey Davis was very pleased that Megan Peterson existed and was sorted into Slytherin with her. She had been aware that there was a great chance of her ending up in the snake house, she dreamed of being a famous singer and loved to be the best at her muggle classes after all, but she was quite scared of being killed in her sleep for being a half-blood.<p>

However, when the muggleborn was sorted into her house and insulted Malfoy, Tracey was really relieved. They would have their attentions at Megan and what would be a half-blood in their house compared to a muggleborn?

Their common room was a long, low underground room with rough stone walls and ceiling, from which round, greenish lamps were hanging on chains. A fire was crackling under an elaborately carved mantelpiece ahead of them. There were some black couches and armchairs that looked really expansive and Tracey had to control herself to not whistle in admiration when she first saw the room, it wasincredible.

"So, first years, it's time for us to have a serious talk." A red-haired prefect started talking, Tracey remember his name was Percy and by the colour of his hair he was obviously a Weasley. "Some of you might have the wrong idea of Slytherin and it's my job to remove them from your heads."

The way the fifth year boy held himself was truly composed, if it wasn't for his hair nobody would ever guess he was a Weasley.

"Most of us don't support the blood purity ideals as everyone uses to think." The boy eyed Draco Malfoy in particular and Tracey smirked slightly. "Actually, a lot of our fellow housemates are half-bloods and some even muggleborns."

The female prefect who was besides Weasley chuckled slightly, telling everyone that the last part wasn't true. Everybody unconsciously looked at the Peterson girl, but she didn't seem to mind it much. To say the truth, Tracey thought the girl to be a little odd and overly calm.

"As the other houses have a bit of prejudice with us, we have one simple rule: stick together. This means that if a fellow housemate needs help of any sorts and you _can_ help him or her, you will." He offered them a small smile. "If any of you need something you can seek any prefect out too."

"If you, baby snakes, would accept some advice, don't hold too tight into your families beliefs." The blond girl with a prefect crest on her robes offered the group of first years. "Hogwarts is a neutral place, after all, and these seven years are a great opportunity to make strong alliances."

"Davis, right?" Pansy Parkinson asked her when she came out from the bathroom.

Bulstrode and Greengrass were in their school robes as was Parkinson. Tracey nodded.

"The prefect told us to meet her in the common room so she can guide us to the great hall." The grey eyed girl had a nasal tone that made Tracey grimace slightly. Parkinson eyed her up and down and Davis felt a bit conscious of her simple pyjamas. "If you change in five minutes we'll wait for you."

"Should we wake her?" Tracey asked, pointing to the muggleborn who still slept heavily in her bed.

Parkinson seemed to be having an internal debate. It probably was because of the prefect's speech from last night.

"Peterson!" Parkinson all but yelled.

Green eyes popped open, startled.

"What the hell?" the small girl asked inspecting the entire room.

"We're going to the great hall." Greengrass explained. "You have five minutes to get ready."

"Go on without me." Peterson mumbled and turned her back to the girls, probably sleeping again.

Pansy sighed and stormed off, angry for having their attempt of being civil ignored by the muggleborn. The two other girls followed behind her and Tracey put her school robes on quickly.

* * *

><p>Megan woke up and didn't know what time it was. Fortunately, the Bulstrode girl had put a clock on her nightstand and Megan could see that it was eight thirty, which meant she was kind of late.<p>

Jumping out of the bed, the girl went to the bathroom quickly and brushed her teeth while she peed. She came back into the room and opened her trunk, cursing herself for having gone to sleep while her roommates unpacked the night before.

When she realized she was as bad at packing as she was at unpacking and had put all her books over her clothes the girl sighed and decided to use the same school robes she wore the night before.

Megan dressed quickly and settled for doing a ponytail in her nest of hair due to the lack of time. If it wasn't her first day she wouldn't be in such a rush, but today she needed to receive her schedule and also start to learn the way to classes.

Feeling proud of herself – she looked at Bulstrode's clock and saw it had passed just ten minutes – Megan left for the common room with a smile in her face.

"Peterson, wasn't it?" The red haired prefect from the night before approached her the moment she stepped a foot in the common room. "I'm Percy Weasley.

"Call me Megan." She told him, because she really hated her surname.

"Just if you call me Percy." He smiled down at her and she grinned oddly back. She wasn't used to people being nice to her. "I came here to see what had happened to you."

"What?"

"You're the only first year who wasn't at the great hall at eight thirty to get your schedule."

"I overslept." She grinned sheepishly and the boy chuckled.

"Try to be more punctual next time. Anyway, here's your schedule." He offered her a piece of parchment. "Come, I'll take you to the great hall."

She scanned her timetable and saw that her first subject was Potions in the dungeons. Call her lazy, but she was not looking forward to go all the way to the great hall and just to come back to the dungeons in less than twenty minutes.

"Actually, I think I'll head to class already."

"You can't skip breakfast." Percy told her horrified with the idea. "You're too skinny already."

"It's okay, I'm used to it anyway." Megan assured him, remembering of all the days she spent at a cupboard with just a meal per day.

"If my mum find out I'm helping a little girl skip her breakfast she kills me." The prefect mumbled. "I guess I'll take you to the Potion classroom then."

They walked for a few minutes in silence, until Percy spoke up.

"It get easier you know." The older boy whispered and Megan looked at him quizzically. "They'll know you and then they'll stop this nonsense. Trust me, in the first half of my first year all they could do was call me a blood traitor, but then I proved my value, I guess, and they're my allies now, even friends, I dare say.

Megan pondered it for a moment. She hadn't had friends in her life, as everyone she knew disliked her, but it never bothered her much. However, maybe it would be nice to be able of having pleasant talks with people, like she had at the train with Brandon and Ron.

She decided at that moment that she would stop pushing people away like she did this morning. Maybe having people who liked her would be nice.

"We're here." Percy told her when they reached a big wooden door.

"Thank you Percy." She gave him a true smile.

Yes, maybe it would be nice.

* * *

><p><em><strong>Sooo<strong>_**, what do you think? Please let me know :) **

**Just to be clear, in this World Snape, Tom, Lucius, Narcisa, Bellatrix, Lily and the marauders all attended Hogwarts together, some are a bit older but they all were at the school together at some point. Put this in mind, because it's important.**

**I don't have nothing to do at the moment so all my attentions are in this fic nowadays, just want to point it out because if I suddenly start to update slower it's because I got a life again somehow.**

**Don't forget to review and let me know what you thought. ^^**


	4. The Creation of a Prophecy

The first Potions class of the year was, in a lack of words to describe it, memorable. Snape had wandered through his Slytherin/Gryffindor first year classroom as an overgrown bat implanting fear inside every student's heart. In less than twenty minutes he took ten points from Ronald Weasley and Brandon Potter each and with just that action he obtained hate from the Gryffindors and awe from his baby snakes.

Riddle could be the Head of the house, but Snape would always look after his growing snakes, one way or another.

He had antagonised Potter's spawn from the very begin of the class and was in his way to insult the boy a little more for not being able to brew a simple cure for boils potion when his eyes locked with a familiar pair of green orbs.

He controlled his gasp and examined the muggleborn further. She was very petit and didn't look older than nine. Her face was heart shaped, she had a button nose, full lips and a bird's nest instead of hair, but it was her eyes that drained his attention. They were too big and too green and they made her whole face look disproportional.

Maybe it was because of the odd dull look they held.

Severus shook his head and cursed himself internally for apparently being in his way to become crazy. He couldn't remember Lily every time he saw some green eyed girl, talk about obsessive.

"Ten points from Gryffindor for being a dunderhead and not being able of stirring clockwise." He declare to the Longbottom boy whilst what he truly wanted to say was:

_One thousand points from Slytherin for having green eyes and making me remember of my childhood crush. _

_And ten thousand points from Gryffindor for being born and becoming a walking reminder of the union of my former nemesis and said childhood crush._

But he couldn't do such nonsense, could he?

* * *

><p>When his dad and Sirius told him Snape was an overgrown evil bat who never washed his hair Brandon didn't thought they were speaking the absolute truth. The Potions Master was an insufferable git, a prat of the worst kind. Sirius and his father had warned him that Snivellus might pick on him because of their old quarrel, but Brandon's mother assured him Snape wouldn't do such a thing because he was too mature to hold grudge about things that happened more than ten years ago.<p>

It seemed the old bat was very immature then.

"He's a git." Ron growled when they left the classroom.

"That's the understandment of the year." Brandon agreed.

They had a twenty minutes break now before DADA, but the two boys decided to head to class already, as the DADA classroom was in the dungeons too.

Brandon folded the Marauder's Maps back and sit in the floor next to the classroom's door, Ron followed his actions.

"Hello Ron, Brad." Megan Peterson, the Slytherin muggleborn that he met at the shop, greeted them. He grimace slightly and Ron let out a low growl besides him.

The problem was that Brandon didn't know what to think about the girl. He had liked her quite enough before the sorting, but then the hat put her into Slytherin and things got complicated.

His dad and godfather always said that all Slytherins are evil dishonest snakes and that he should never be friends with one. They were selfish little cowards who thought only about them and weren't able of keeping friendships. Even his mum was surprising quiet when they said it which meant it was probably true.

But then he met mysterious and quiet Megan, who, despite not talking much, had something in her eyes that fascinated him, maybe they reminded him of his mum, the colour was the same after all.

He didn't know what to do about her.

She wasn't like Malfoy, easy to hate, but at the same time she wasn't very likeable either.

"My name is not Brad." He decided for this neutral answer. "It's Brandon."

"I know." She said dully.

He looked at her expecting some explanation but she offered none. The girl just sat across from him, for Ron's annoyment.

"You must be really evil for getting sorted into Slytherin." Ron spat at the girl and Brandon grimaced, they didn't had to be friends with her but he didn't think they needed to antagonise the girl due to her sorting. "You know, being a muggleborn and all. I don't think it has ever happened before."

"It happens sometimes." For Brandon's surprise the girl didn't seem angry, or sad, or anything. "At least that's what your brother said."

_There_. She hit a spot and her smirk showed that it was what she wanted.

Ron's entire face got red and Brandon wished the teacher would arrive soon.

"This hate towards my house is quite strange, you know." Megan spoke sweetly. "I mean, you have _family_ there."

"Every Weasley was in Gryffindor!" Ron all but yelled. "Percy's an exception. I'm certain the hat made a mistake."

"You sound like I've just _offended_ you or your family." The girl's tone was flat, and Brandon had the impression she was _toying_ with Ron. "But I was only stating the obvious truth."

Ron got up and grabbed his wand. Brandon would worry if the tall boy knew some spell or curse, but he didn't know any so it was quite okay.

"At least I _have_ a family." Brandon grimaced at Ron's words. The boy remembered Megan telling them both she lived in an orphanage, but that wasn't the kind of thing he would ever use in an argument, his mum had taught him to have some sense, thank you very much.

Megan, in the other hand, didn't seem affected by Ron's words and Brandon was starting to think the green eyed girl didn't have feelings at all when she _grinned_ at Ron.

"Interacting with the Gryffindorks, Peterson?" Malfoy asked as he came into view. Brandon snorted. "I think you've just found the perfect friends for you. They're muggle lovers, you know."

"Piss off, Malfoy." The hazel eyed boy spat.

"What is this Potter?" Crabbe and Goyle were behind the blond, but Brandon wasn't going to be intimidated by them. "Found a girlfriend already?"

"Who, Ron?" Megan asked, obviously knowing Malfoy meant her.

Ron's ear became pink and Brandon sent a nasty look towards the girl. The Slytherin boys chuckled.

"Enter." Professor Riddle ordered the group as he opened his classroom's door.

Brandon hadn't seen him coming and by the faces of everybody else they didn't either.

The tall man was interesting to say the least. He radiated power, magic and darkness. His face was empty of emotions, but there was something in his eyes that screamed danger.

Brandon sighed before entering the door. A sour look invaded his face when he realised that his Monday mornings would be truly awful. He would have the classes of the two most feared teachers in Hogwarts and they would be with Slytherin.

When he passed professor Riddle, Brandon instantly knew that while Snape's bad reputation was due to him being a mean, rude and dishonest git, Riddle's reputation was because he was truly dark and dangerous. His dark blue eyes with tints of red transmitted it clearly.

* * *

><p>Tom's first class of the school year had been rather tedious. It was a RavenclawHufflepluff third year class and even with Ravenclaws wanting to prove their intelligence and Hufflepluffs being hard workers they lacked the good and old rivalry.

Most teachers discouraged the rivalry between houses, but Tom certainly wasn't most teachers. He liked it, it made the students work hard to outstand the others and then he could extract the best from everyone. It was a win-win situation, he helped the kids be as good as they could be and then, after they finished school, he could recruit the best ones.

That was the reason why he demanded that all of his classes from first to fifth year would be Hufflepluff/Ravenclaw and Slytherin/Gryffindor. The first was a good combination as said before and the last had what the first pair lacked: natural hatred towards each other.

When he saw the first years separated by their houses - Gryffindor in the right and Slytherin in the left - without him saying anything, he smirked a little. That was what he was talking about, the kids had barely being sorted and already understood how their houses worked.

"I'm professor Riddle and I will be your DADA teacher for probably all your seven years in Hogwarts." He started his lesson at ten sharp. "I have some rules and…"

He was rudely interrupted by a bushy haired Gryffindor girl.

"I'm sorry, professor." She was breathless. "I got lost."

Some girls from her own house snickered and Tom rolled his eyes.

"This is the first and last time that anyone will arrive late without consequences." He told everyone and the girl ran to take a sit, blushing furiously.

"As I was saying before being rudely interrupted, I have some rules for my classes, it's actually only three and they're very simple." He looked into every kid's eyes to put some fear in their bones before he explained how he worked.

"First of them is never be late." He looked to the bushy haired girl and she blushed even more, sliding in her sit in a failed attempt to hide from him. "For me tardiness is a signal of disinterest and if you're not interested in my class don't even bother to come."

"The second is to never disturb my lessons and I don't think I need to elaborate here, do I?" his voice and expression told the first years that anybody who asked him to elaborate would be considered a dunderhead.

"And the last one is to never, _ever_, disobey me." He finished telling them his rules and sat on the edge of his table, still facing everyone.

"I have a quite different method from every other teacher here in Hogwarts. For me, your textbooks are useless," he heard a loud gasp from the Gryffindor side "and you'll consult them if you think necessary, but don't bother bringing them to class."

"I make a contest in every class of mine. It's similar to the House Cup, but I can assure you it is more _entertaining_. You can call it the DADA contest or anything that pleases you. It works in the following way:

I will divide the class into pairs and each member of the pair will be responsible for each other. You will train and study for my class together and throughout the year there will be some tests that, depending on your results, will ensure points for the pair.

I'll also give you points for any accomplishment of yours outside the classroom that I think to be worth it. At the end of the year, the duo who has accumulated the most points will win the competition and I'll owe them a favour."

"That's it?" _Another_ Weasley asked him and Tom fought the urge of rolling his eyes. There was only one member from that family who deserved his attention and he was at his house, the rest were a bunch of stupid Gryffindors and, apparently, this one was the same. "I mean, that's not a very good prize."

"A favour from someone like professor Riddle is hardly a bad prize, you idiot." A very smart Slytherin boy, who Riddle thought was a Nott, spat at the red headed.

"It's better than the House Cup, we don't even get to bring it home if our house wins." A dark skinned boy from Gryffindor said.

"What's your name, boy?" Tom asked.

"Dean Thomas." He answered lowly, seeming a bit shy for having Riddle talking to him directly.

"So, let's begin the fun part, shall we?" the professor asked and received lots of eager nods. "Everyone grab your wands, you have one hour to master the Knockback Jinx. The incantation is _Flipendo_ and the wand movement is like this."

He used the jinx in a training dummy to show the kids. The dummy instantly fell to the floor.

"The Knockback Jinx feels like a blow to the chest, knocking its victim back." He told them as he used his wand to restore the dummy to its place. "Everyone grab a dummy and practise it. If you have any doubts just call me."

The first ones to master the jinx were the bushy haired girl, who he learned that was named Hermione Granger, and his Horcrux. When Granger mastered it she went to her housemates to offer help, especially Longbottom, while the green eyed girl just sat and watched while the rest of her classmates worked.

When Goyle finally accomplished to knock his dummy to the floor Tom decided to start his tests for the formation of the pairs.

"Peterson and Granger, go to the front." He ordered.

The Gryffindor girl all but ran to the big empty space in front of the class while the Slytherin took some seconds to decide if she got up or not. Tom frowned at the girl and she seemed to hurry up a little at the sight of his sour face.

The sight of them facing each other was kind of amusing to Tom, both were muggleborns with unruly hair.

"At the count of three get ready to use the jinx on each other." He told them and Hermione looked both eager and afraid to duel.

His Horcrux, on the other hand, looked just as expressionless as always.

"One, two…" the bushy haired Gryffindor tightened the hold in her wand. "Three."

"_Flipendo_." Granger yelled, a yellowish white flesh of light left her wand towards the dark haired girl, who simply took a step to the right.

Granger looked furious when the jinx missed her opponent and landed in the wall instead.

"Is she allowed to do…" she started to ask indignantly to the teacher when she felt a blow to her chest and collapsed to the floor.

Everybody looked to the Slytherin girl who had taken advantage of the other girl's distraction to whisper the incantation. She had a disconcerting sweet grin in her face.

"I won, right?" she asked Tom and he couldn't hold back his smirk.

"Yes, you did."

That girl was surely something else and if his suspicions were right he would bring her to his side, one way or another.

"First lesson, kids." He announced as Longbottom helped Granger back to her feet. "Never take your eyes off your opponent."

As the duels kept going the results were:

Millicent Bulstrode X Lavender Brown – Brown won

Neville Longbottom X Pansy Parkinson – Parkinson won

Seamus Finnigan X Blaise Zabini – Finnigan won

Brandon Potter X Draco Malfoy – Malfoy attacked before Tom finished the countdown.

Parvati Patil X Tracey Davis – Patil won

Theodore Nott X Ronald Weasley – Nott won

Daphne Greengrass X Dean Thomas – Greengrass won

Vincent Crabbe X Gregory Goyle – Crabbe won

"This year's pairs will be based on my observations as you still don't know everybody much. In the next years I'll let you choose the pairs, but for now they will be:

Lavender Brown with Parvati Patil. I chose you both because while I watched you practise I noted that you two have similar ways of facing your opponent, you just attack before pondering anything. If I paired any of you with Nott, for example, it wouldn't work as he observed Weasley a lot before positioning himself to duel."

Lavender let out a small squeal as Patil went to stand beside her. Patil smiled to the girl in return.

And he went on, naming the pairs and explaining the motives behind.

Millicent Bulstrode with Blaise Zabini

Pansy Parkinson and Theodore Nott

Neville Longbottom with Ronald Weasley

Seamus Finnigan and Dean Thomas

Tracey Davis with Daphne Greengrass

Vincent Crabbe and Gregory Goyle

"I was going to pair Granger and Parkinson initially, but after the duel I wouldn't do this never in a million years. Granger and Potter are both very honest and, for what I've seen, stick hardly to the rules. Peterson and Malfoy in the other hand…" Tom trailed off, making some Slytherins snicker.

"So the two last pairs will be Hermione Granger with Brandon Potter and Draco Malfoy paired up with Megan Peterson."

* * *

><p>Megan was growing quite fond of Hogwarts already. The classes were awesome and even the teachers being quite rude she supposed they were good. The Potions class had been a bit awkward at first, with professor Snape antagonizing the Gryffindors and Brad in particular, but when he let them practice at the first lesson she liked him much more. If there was something Megan liked was to <em>do<em> things, she hated theory but loved action.

It was even more awesome when professor Riddle told them he wouldn't use the textbook in his classes, and when he bloody taught her how to push people and things down to the floor with her wand she was sure DADA would be one of her favourite classes, if not the most liked.

It had been quite simple, actually, and she didn't understand why Goyle had so much difficulty in doing it. You just had to pay attention at your wand movement and the incantation and, of course, want it badly enough.

When she mastered it and sat down to observe her classmates she realised that the bunch of them were insecure, most of them were doing everything right, but they were saying _Flipendo_ as if they were asking their wands to _maybe_ do the jinx. If her facility to it meant anything was that you shouldn't ask your wand to do anything, you should _order_ it to do what you wanted.

The sight of Lavender Brown getting hit by Neville's dummy was very amusing and Megan let out a chuckle.

When professor Riddle called her name and told her to go to the front of the class she grew a bit suspicious. Maybe he would tell the kids to make fun of the two mudbloods, he _was_ head of Slytherin after all. But that sour look in his face made her remember vaguely of Mrs Peterson's own grimace and the wizard's one was even worse. If there was one thing Megan knew for sure in her life was to never ignore an adult's frown sent in her way, it would only make things worse.

She had waited for Granger to make the first move and took advantage of the situation when the other muggleborn was distracted. Tracey Davis sent her a smile when she joined the other students as Bulstrode was getting ready to face Brown.

"Well done." The brown eyed girl offered and Megan smirked back.

"Thanks." She heard professor Riddle calling Tracey's name as Zabini helped Bulstrode up. "Good luck."

She saw Tracey hesitate when the countdown finished and Patil didn't think twice. The brown eyed girl felt, her head hitting the floor hard.

"Are you okay?" Megan asked as she helped the girl up.

"I'm fine." She had a sour look in her face, though. "I heisted because I was scared of hurting Patil."

"She didn't even blink." Tracey nodded, defeated. "Next time you'll kick her ass."

The half-blood giggled at the small girl attempt to cheer her up.

"I will."

When the duels – if you could call them that – were over, Riddle divided the pairs and told them the reason of each duo.

Blondie's face was really precious when he found out he would have to spend the entire year working with a mudblood. Megan, on the other hand, didn't care much about who would be her pair, as long as she won the competition everyone was fine with her.

"Class dismissed." Professor Riddle declared when he finished pairing them up. "If any of you aren't feeling very well because of the falls go to the infirmary."

Megan started to leave, Tracey Davis beside her, when she heard the teacher calling her name.

"Miss Peterson." She turned back, hesitantly. "I would like to speak with you."

"I'll see you at lunch." The half-blood told her and left the room.

Megan started to grow anxious when Brad and Ron stepped out the classroom and she was the last student remaining. When Riddle closed the door she pondered what would happened if she ran.

Anything good never happened when she was alone with an adult, she had lots of marks on her back to prove it.

He sat at his desk and Megan continued standing, but even like this he was taller than her.

"I'm not going to attack you, brat." The professor spat when he saw her stiffness, she just sent him a smirk. "Anyway, as you know I'm your head of your house and I'll have this conversation with every first year student at Slytherin."

She kept looking at him emotionless.

"If you ever need anything that I can help you with it you can come look for me at my office. It's in the end of this corridor."

"Okay." She took one step towards the door, but his voice stopped her.

"As you live in an orphanage and we don't know much about your parents I would like to make some tests with your blood."

"You can find my parents with it?" she asked, sounding a bit too hopeful for her liking.

"I'm afraid I can't do that, but it's…" he started talking, but she interrupted him.

"What do you need?" her voice was even more devoid of emotions, if possible. "Is it just my blood?"

"Yes." He answered and grabbed a dagger inside of the drawers from his desk. "Give me your hand."

She did, and he made a deep cut in it. When the blood started to pour he placed a potion vial under her hand so the blood could fall into it.

When he was satisfied with the amount of blood he had he grabbed a tissue from a box on the top of his table and covered her hand with it. Professor Riddle fetched his wand and tapped it twice in her hand, murmuring something Megan didn't understand.

To the girl's surprise, when the teacher removed the tissue of her hand she found it unharmed like it was never cut in the first place. She looked down and put her hand in her skirt's pocket. Not knowing what to make of it.

"Can I go?" when the tall wizard nodded she almost ran from the classroom.

* * *

><p>If Tom was intrigued before, now he was <em>fucking<em> _obsessed_ with the girl. In the tests he'd done he found out that her blood was a mix from a really ancient kind of magic and a new one. It meant she was a half-blood, but the power that her blood held was incredible.

To make things even more interesting he had received a letter from Regulus that afternoon.

_Your office's fireplace, today, eleven pm._

_-Blackbird_

That night Tom sat by his fireplace, reading some fourth year's holidays essays while Nagini had a snack by his feet.

"_**I've met another speaker today, master**_." The python told him, sounding as excited as a snake could be.

"_**Really?**_" he frowned, asking himself if the girl had spoken to Nagini in front of anyone. "_**How did this happen?**_"

"_**I was on my way to the forest when some annoying round boy spotted me. And started screaming**_"

"_**Nagini…**_" Riddle sighed, not wanting to deal with any more problem. "_**How many times do I have to tell you to avoid been seeing by the students? They're scared of you.**_"

At that, the snake made a hissing sound similar to a chuckle.

"_**The girl isn't, tough. She's nice, she told me I'm pretty.**_" Tom rolled his eyes at his vain familiar.

He was ready to replay when his fireplace's flames started to turn green.

"Riddle." Regulus's fire head called him. "I have some news."

"What are you waiting for? Spill."

"Are you familiar with the Master of Death's legend?"

"The one that says a Master of Death arises every five hundred years?" He asked not understanding the reason Regulus was talking about that nonsense. Regulus nodded and Tom sighed. "That's bullshit, there is no Master of Death as there is no death's book either."

"Well, there was a prophecy eleven years ago that said…" The younger man fetched a piece of paper and started to read it aloud.

_The one who'll be called Master of Death approaches_

_Born to that who descends of the one who first tricked death_

_Born as the seventh month dies_

_The Master of Death will have the power to control souls and magic_

_And it will be these power that will decide which Lord will reign._

"Are you certain?" All the colour had disappeared from the wizard's face.

"Absolutely."

The legend said that since the beginning of times a Master of Death surged every five hundred years. It said that they brought despair, war and death to everywhere they stepped their foot into due to the fact they were soulless beings who were always searching ways of being whole.

However, it was just a dumb story to make children get scared and behave.

_It had to be._

* * *

><p><strong>Hello, guys! How you're doing?<strong>

** So, that's when my story will really begin… Excited? Well, I am…**

**I wish you guys could realize that even Brandon having the influence of his dad and Sirius's he's still a mama's boy and his personality is a mix of James and Lily and himself.**

**Also, as **_**feral-kuga**_** mentioned, there are a lot of stories where there's a blood test in Gringotts and everything, but as there's nothing like that in canon, I decided to not put it into my story either. It would be all too easy. :)**

**Anyway, I hope you guys like it, thanks for reading and don't forget to review :) **


	5. The Creation of a Quidditch Player

If Megan knew Hogwarts would be so exciting and bloody crazy she would never have objected to the idea of going.

First of all, it was full of staircases of different kinds and if you'd have to describe the castle in one word it would be huge. And, son, _did she get lost on it_.

In the first day of school, after a rather disgusting Herbology class, she met Nagini, her first instantaneous friend.

She and Tracey – who she was growing quite fond of – were at their way to the great hall to have dinner when Neville Longbottom let out a piercing scream, lots of older students ran to the boy, worried something was happening when Megan heard a low and hissing voice.

"_**Shut up, boy. I won't eat you.**_" Megan looked down and saw a beautiful dark green python. Neville, on the other hand, continued to scream. "_**If you don't stop screaming I'll bite you**_."

"_**I think that would only make it worse**_." Megan offered some advice to the snake, who stopped paying attention at the round boy and looked at her with what the girl thought to be a quizzically look.

"_**You're a speaker.**_" The snake looked quite vibrant. "_**I thought my master was the only one**_."

"_**I have no idea what a speaker is**_." Megan was unaware of several pairs of wide eyes fixed at her.

"_**I like the colour of your eyes**_." The python ignored her last comment. "_**They're the same colour of my scales, but brighter**_."

It wasn't every day that Megan met a talking snake, much more a nice one.

"_**Well, you're scales are very pretty, so thanks**_." It was true, the big python was nothing but stunning and looked quite amused at the dark haired girl's comment. "_**Do you have a name?**_"

"_**It's Nagini**_." The snake answered. "_**It was nice to chat, but I'm on my way to hunt my dinner**_." Nagini moved her head in what Megan thought was a nod or a wave, and resumed her crawling through the castle.

"Hum, Megan?" Tracey called.

"What?" she looked back at her roommate and saw a lot of eyes on her, several from older students. "That's not a thing you see every day, hum?"

A lot of whispers began and she was quite surprised that even older students were shocked to see a giant talking snake, it seemed that not _every_ kind of odd things were considered normal in the Magical World.

"How the hell are you a parselmouth?" Tracey frowned at Megan.

Davis explained to her that a parselmouth was a wizard or a witch who could speak parseltongue, the language of snakes. It seemed that it was quite rare and every wizard and witch who had it was dark.

"I think this will guarantee you a lot of respect in our house, Salazar Slytherin was the most famous parselmouth, after all." Megan didn't think much about it. There were baked potatoes in front of her, so she absolutely had more important things to think about than rare wizardry gifts.

However, it started to bother her when everywhere she went the whispers followed her.

"She must be so dark."

"I heard she's a pureblood who killed her entire family, and that's why she lives in an orphanage."

"They're saying she's professor Riddle's bastard daughter, he _is_ the only known parselmouth besides her."

_It was getting ridiculous._

Besides this, he classes were quite cool, not as much as DADA, but they were at least a bit interesting, with the exception of History of Magic – who knew a ghost could be so boring? She would never watch a ghost horror movie hidden from Mrs Peterson with the same eyes again.

Her favourite classes, outside DADA, were Potions – Snape's speech about being able of teaching them how to bottle fame, brew glory and stop death really got her attention, Charms – the exciting way the tiny little man, or Professor Flitwick as he preferred to be called, got into her and it seemed that charms would be the class they would deal with everyday magic the most, and finally, but not least, there was Transfiguration – Professor McGonagall could turn into a bloody cat and, even the first classes being only theory, she promised them she would teach them how to turn things into others soon.

Astronomy would have been pretty cool if it wasn't for the fact that she was forced to get up at bloody midnight to go to a tall as hell tower in the bloody cold, and they still expected her to wake up in time to go to class the other day. Wizards had no respect for her sleep_._

A bloke worth mentioning was Filch, the personification of the devil, and his cat, the devil's most trusted demon or Mrs Norris as devil called her. That guy and his loyal cat weren't normal – not even by the wizard's standards – they both had weird glowing eyes, like they wanted to eat your brain or something. The cat's eyes were even creepier, they followed Megan everywhere and the girl swore Mrs's Norris dearest ambition was to slit her throat.

At Thursday's lunch Malfoy sat across from her with a sour look in his face. His expression was a mix of fear and indecision and when he glanced at her for the tenth time she decided she had had enough.

"What is this, blondie?" she asked him after taking a sip of pumpkin juice.

"Nothing." When his cheeks glowed a light shade of pink she decided to tease him a little out of boredom.

"Actually, I think _there is_ something wrong." She smirked at the blond boy. "You haven't called me a mudblood since Monday. Why's that?"

She knew exactly why. Since people discovered she was a parselmouth they grew very scared of her, mostly the other houses' members, but even some Slytherins glanced at her fearfully just to divert their eyes when she stared back. It was quite amusing, to say the truth.

"I wanted to make a peace offer." He confessed and Megan chuckled. "We are DADA partners and it would not be very wise to hold grudge towards each other."

"Of course, blondie."

The boy didn't looked amused.

* * *

><p>Draco wasn't pleased with life at the moment. First of all he thinks there's a mudblood in Slytherin, antagonises her about it just to find out some hours later that she's a bloody parselmouth.<p>

He had written father about her, and how she would be his partner for the entire year, and when he received the answer his heart went cold.

_Dear Draco,_

_The news you sent me were great, son. I was about to send you a letter asking you to be friendly with this mysterious girl who your godfather, Severus, told me about._

_As I heard, she was discovered a parselmouth like Tom Riddle, who had sent me a letter asking for some favours. – To look into girls who were born between July and August of 1980 in the Wizard World._

_Suspicions are that she is Riddle's bastard daughter and, even if that is not true, it will be good to have her acquainted._

_I hope you are having a good time at Hogwarts and congratulations for being sorted into Slytherin._

_Ps: Your mother sends her love and misses you._

_Love,_

_-Dad_

He had screwed up and the only thing he could do was try and fix it.

The grey eyed boy had offered peace to Peterson at lunch, but that girl was hard to read. She had just smirked at him and said 'of course' and the way she did it pissed him off. To say the truth, everything she said or did annoyed him. That constant amused look she always used gave the impression that she knew a secret everybody else knew not and she was just toying with them to spend the time.

* * *

><p>"None of you is to move while I take this boy to the hospital wing! You leave those brooms where they are or you'll be out of Hogwarts before you can say 'Quidditch.' Come on, dear."<p>

Madam Hooch told the class as she put an arm around a crying Neville Longbottom. Megan chuckled and frowned at her broom, a bit wary of the damage it could do to her.

"Did you see his face, the great lump?" Malfoy burst into laughter and the other Slytherins joined him.

"Shut up, Malfoy." Parvati Patil, the girl who beat Tracey in the duel, snapped at Blondie.

"Ooh, sticking up for Longbottom?" said Pansy Parkinson. "Never thought you'd like fat little cry-babies, Parvati."

Megan snorted at the image Pansy put into her head, Patil and Longbottom kissing was not a very pleasing sight.

She looked in the direction of the castle, wondering if Madam Hooch would in fact come back or if she could go take a nap in her dorm. A sparkling ball caught her eyes and as she picked it up it turned red.

"What is this?" She asked the nearest person.

"I think it's a Remembrall." Daphne Greengrass told her and chuckled. "Typical of that fatty boy. His gran must had sent it to him."

"Why it changed colours?" she wondered, the ball was quite pretty but useless.

"It turns scarlet when the person who's holding it forgets something." She explained.

Megan frowned, what was she forgetting? She didn't need any books and with a quick look at her she saw she was wearing all the clothes she was supposed to.

"Give that here, Peterson." said Brad quietly. Everyone stopped talking to watch.

Megan smiled sweetly.

"Don't worry, Brad. I'll make sure he receives it back." The tone in her voice showed clearly that she had no intention of doing it, at least not until she found out what she was forgetting.

"Give it here!" Ron yelled and the green eyed girl laughed.

If there was a person she liked to tease was Ronald Weasley, it was so easy to anger him.

"I don't think so, cherry." She smiled as his entire face went pink.

Ron ran towards her, ready to take the Remembrall forcefully. Megan quickly threw the ball to Malfoy's hand, who caught it easily.

Malfoy leapt onto his broomstick and took off.

"Come and get it, Weasley!" he shouted, hovering on the top of an oak tree.

Brad and Ron grabbed their broom.

"No!" shouted Hermione Granger. "Madam Hooch told us not to move and as your DADA partner, Brandon, I'm supposed to prevent you from getting us all in trouble."

The boys ignored the Gryffindor girl and, being the one who started it, Megan refused to be left out from the fun.

She mounted the broom and kicked hard against the ground and, for her amusement, she left the ground easily. Air rushed through her hair and her robes and the sensation she felt was inexplicable, it made her feel amazing, wonderful and _alive_.

"Give it here." Weasley demanded. "Or I'll knock you off that broom!"

"Oh, yeah?" said Malfoy, trying to sneer, but looking worried when Ron stroke out to him.

"Throw it." Megan nodded towards the ground and Blondie did as told.

The ball rose up in the air and then started to fall.

She leaned forward and pointed her broom handle down — next second she was gathering speed in a steep dive, racing the ball — wind whistled in her ears, mingled with the screams of people watching — she stretched out her hand, just to see another hand besides hers. She looked at her side and saw Brad almost glued to her. Deciding she really wanted to win this little match, Megan threw a quick punch at the boy's face and caught the ball, just in time to pull her broom straight, and she toppled gently onto the grass with the Remembrall clutched safely in her fist.

She looked at her side and grinned nastily at Potter, who looked at her quite shocked.

"MEGAN PETERSON!" She heard a male voice yell at the same time a female one screamed:

"BRANDON POTTER!"

Her heart sank and she grimaced, but put a blank mask on her face quickly. She refused to show everybody how fearful she was of the sight of a ferocious looking professor Riddle and a stern looking McGonagall marching towards her.

Megan realised that Cherry and Blondie were long in the ground and that the only ones caught mid-air were her and Brad. She smirked at Malfoy and sent a teasing wink at Ron.

She grinned when the students from both houses tried to reason with the professors, each one telling a different story.

"I don't want to hear none of it." Riddle ordered and everybody shut their mouths.

"I suggest you deal with the girl from your house and I'll deal with mine." McGonagall informed the man.

When Riddle grabbed her arm with such force she was sure it would leave bruises, Megan sent what she imagined to be a pleading look to the Transfiguration's teacher. She knew the witch was a very strict professor, but her fame wasn't as bad as Riddle's by far.

"Are you trying to kill yourself?" the tall wizard dug his nails into her skin, but she refused to flinch.

With one last glance to a guilty looking Draco, Megan let herself be dragged by a fuming DADA teacher.

But even being caught and having the chance of being expelled from Hogwarts, Megan regretted nothing. The sensation she experienced from flying was the most amazing she had ever felt in her life, and the most exciting thought in her mind was that she _had_ to do it again.

* * *

><p>Tom Marvolo Riddle was <em>furious<em> to say the least. That small and weak-looking little snake had the fucking audacity of putting part of his fucking soul in harm's way.

She was raised in a muggle orphanage for Merlin's sake. It meant that she didn't know anything about broomsticks and flying at all and yet the girl dared to mount on a broom for the first time and fucking _dive_ towards the ground.

_Stupid brat._

The worst part was that the Potter boy was quite good too. His father must have taught the boy how to fly since he could walk. Tom remembered the young and foolish James Potter from his years at Hogwarts and how the presumptuous dark-hating guy used to love that stupid game.

The important part was that he knew the Gryffindors was lacking a seeker as Charles Weasley had _finally_ graduated the year before and the small Brandon Potter would fill the role perfectly. He knew Minerva should be already on her way to ask the old fool to make an exception in the school's rules.

Tom knew that Terence Higgs, who was currently Slytherin's seeker, was much better as a chaser than as a seeker, and the girl who was practically running to keep up with his pace would fit the role perfectly.

He refused to lose another Quidditch Cup to the Gryffindors, he thought that would be over when that Weasley graduated, but with the Potter brat as a seeker Tom knew that if he didn't put the tiny girl in the team they could give up already.

He stopped outside the Potions' classroom and let go of the girl's arm. She immediately flinched away from him and caressed the arm he was previously holding.

When he knocked at the door the green eyed girl sent him a nasty glare.

"What?" she asked and let go of her arm. Riddle could see bruises that fit his hand perfectly were already forming in the girl's pale skin. "You two are taking turns torturing me before I get expelled?"

"Don't be stupid." He glared at her, but she dared to hold his gaze.

The door opened and Snape put his head outside the classroom, looking bitterly as usual.

"Severus, may I speak with Marcus Flint for a short moment?"

The large built boy left the classroom, his eyes widening a bit when he saw professor Riddle waiting to talk to him.

"I found you a seeker."

"Who, _her_?" The disdain in his voice was notable when the boy pointed to the girl, who grasped a piece of Tom's robes unconsciously.

"Yes, I watched her catching a ball after a fifty-foot dive." Flint squeezed his eyes a bit and looked at the barely four-three foot tall girl, wondering if it could be true,

"We already have Terence Higgs."

"We both know he's a better chaser than a seeker, Mr Flint." He scolded, slightly annoyed due to the boy's refusal to believe in him. "Furthermore, the Potter boy did something similar and I'm sure McGonagall will put him in the Gryffindor team."

"I guess I can try her out Saturday, after lunch." He murmured and looked at the small girl. "Be at the Quidditch pitch midday sharp."

When the three of them finished talking, the brat started to walk away from him and he grabbed her arm again, for the girl's disdain.

"_Not so fast_." He scolded the girl. "We need to have a little chat."

* * *

><p><em>A little chat<em>. These three words made Megan flinch since always. They were the words Mr or Mrs Peterson always used after she made something they didn't approve of and wanted to warn her that she would be punished. Those three words had a lot of meanings: cupboard, beatings, starvation, chores, and many more. She was starting to think that the Hogwarts' teachers didn't use such methods of education and punishment, but those three words had her in high alert again.

It was amusing how she was right since the beginning. The first day of school she had thought that if there was any teacher who used Mrs Peterson's methods it would be McGonagall, Snape and, obviously, Riddle. There were something in his eyes that made her aware whenever he was around her. He made her uncomfortable because she never knew what he was up to, he was rude, but nice at the same time and it irritated her.

"Sit." He commanded when they entered his office.

It was very nice. There were several shelves stuffed with books, an armchair near the fireplace and a desk with a luxurious chair behind it. The entire office were in the colours of black, green and silver, but it gave away a strange warm feeling.

Megan decided to sit in the chair in front of the desk, which was obvious destined to serving as a sit for guests.

She put her hands in her lap and stared at a random point in the wall in front of her. She wondered if professor Riddle liked to use belts or wooden-spoons.

To her surprise, the wizard didn't sit in the chair in front of her or gave any signals of starting a beating session. He just conjured a stool and placed it beside her.

She stared at him with wide eyes was as he grabbed some things in a shelf and sat in the wooden stool. The girl flinched when he put some potion in a cotton ball and started to rub her arm gently where his nails had broken skin.

She gaped at him.

"Don't ever do something like that again." He whispered, but she could hear the threat in his voice. "You could have had yourself killed."

The girl gulped.

"_**Master…**_" Megan heard a familiar hissing voice. "_**Oh, this is the hatchling I told you about. The other speaker.**_"

"_**Hello, Nagini**_." The girl greeted the snake she met earlier in the week.

"_**I knew she was the one you were talking about**_." Tom murmured and put the things he was using on the table. "It should be better by the end of the day."

"_**You provided me a lot of stares and gossip about me**_." The python crawled towards the small girl and curled herself around the girl's torso, the snake's head rested a bit below the Megan's shoulder so she could pet it. "_**They're even saying I'm Riddle's bastard daughter.**_"

The mentioned man chuckled.

"_**Yes, I heard this rumour too**_." Riddle got up and the stool disappeared. He sat on the comfortable-looking chair across Megan instead.

"_**It would be impossible, my master doesn't want any hatchlings**_." Nagini made a sound that reminded of a hissing chuckle.

"_**It's a relief to know**_." Megan responded and ignored the nasty look professor Riddle sent towards her.

She caressed Nagini's head in a specific spot and the snake squeezed her eyes in pleasure.

"_**Don't stop**_." The snake hissed when the girl paused for some seconds. "_**I like her, Tom. Can we keep her?**_"

"_**I'm not a pet**_." Megan argued.

"You have detention Saturday after the Quidditch practise." Tom informed her in a cold tone. "Don't be late."

"_**Am I dismissed?**_" she was still quite shocked for not receiving a beat, but she wasn't going to stay and wait for him to change his mind.

"_**Yes.**_" The tall wizard dismissed her at the same time his snake said:

"_**No**_." Nagini looked at her master with sorrow in her slit-eyes. "_**She's in the middle of a petting session**_."

If pythons could pout, Nagini would have done it when Megan got up from the chair.

* * *

><p>"Did you get expelled?" Tracey hushed her to sit when she spotted Megan entering the great hall to have dinner.<p>

"Are they letting you have one last meal?" Pansy actually sounded a bit sad at this.

"Don't be ridiculous, they're not going to expel her just because she was flying in a broom." Daphne seemed sure about herself, until she grimaced slightly. "Are they?"

"I'm not getting expelled." She assured the girls. They had started talking to her normally after the Nagini accident. "Actually, I'll be doing a try out for the Quidditch team Saturday."

"Do you even know what Quidditch is?" Draco sat between her and Tracey.

"Potter and Weasley explained it to me in the train." She ignored a lot of frowns. "Apparently, Brad's father was a professional player until a couple years ago."

"I think his name is Brandon." Tracey said as she took a huge sip from her pumpkin juice. "My dad knows his."

"I know." She nodded and put a forkful of mashed potatoes in her mouth.

"I thought first years were forbidden of joining the team." Malfoy murmured.

"We are, but professor Riddle said that professor McGonagall will put Brad in the Gryffindor team." She watched as Nott went to grab the last portion of mashed potatoes in the bowl nearest them. "_Flipendo_."

Everybody stared at her when the boy fell of his sit and hit the ground. Megan just smiled sweetly and filled her plate with the bowl's content after putting her wand back in her pocket.

"Are you out of your mind?" the pale boy hissed at her, rubbing his head. He looked like he wanted to hex or throw a punch at her, but seemed to think better and just sat back on the bench.

She was a parselmouth, after all.

"What?" she asked when every first year continued staring at her. "He was going to get the last of it."

"You're crazy." Blondie stated and resumed eating his kidney pie.

"Have you guys tasted the mashed potatoes?" when nobody nodded she grinned. "Too bad for you, it's _amazing_."

"I liked you better when you were a mudblood." Pansy sighed and, to Megan's dismay, everybody nodded in agreement.

"_**Potato.**_" She hissed in parseltongue and all of them flinched or grimaced a little. Megan smirked. "_I_ like myself much more now."

When Crabbe got as far as he could from her without it being obvious Megan's smirk widened.

"Has anyone finished Professor Binn's essay?" Greengrass asked, trying to change subjects. "It's due tomorrow and I did just half of it."

"History of Magic sucks." Blondie whined and even Megan had to agree with this. "I think I'll go to the library tonight."

"I have an idea." Megan declared and got up.

She went to a housemate of hers who she knew was second year and particularly terrified of her – something about being just a half-blood. She poked his shoulder and smiled when the boy grimaced at the sight of her.

"Jimmy, right?" she asked.

"Actually, it's D…" he started, but she cut him off.

"Anyway, I was wondering if you still had your essays from last year?" The boy nodded. "Can I borrow them?"

"I guess…" Jimmy trailed off. "They're still in my trunk, I can get them for you."

"Great! Meet me tomorrow at the common rom, eight o'clock. Can it be?" she asked and the boy nodded again, hesitantly. "Great!"

When she returned to her sit everyone was eyeing her strangely again. However, Malfoy got up from his sit and Nott followed him not much after. When the boys come back with wide grins in their faces, Megan offered her hand to give each of them a high five.

Nott looked at Draco, a bit unsure of himself. Blondie, on the other hand, snapped his hand in Megan's without hesitation and Theodore did the same.

"Don't you guys feel bad for gaining credit for someone else's work?" Davis asked.

"You're kidding, right?" Nott asked and looked at the girl as if she had grown a second head. "What house are you in, again?"

Travis blushed and murmured something inaudible under her breath.

"Besides, it's History of Magic."

The next morning, every Slytherin first year exchanged suspicious pieces of parchment with upper-class housemates.

Saturday arrived quite quickly and the morning was spent playing chess in the common room. At midday she made her way to the Quidditch pitch and met Flint there.

He had showed her the three different kind of balls they used to play and released a golden snitch so she could catch it for him to see. When she did it after three minutes he seemed satisfied.

"Good job." He told her when she got out of the broom. "You're in the team."

She grinned and said farewell to the big boy. With a sigh, she got herself ready to have her first detention.

There was just one thing in her mind besides going back to bed: _Riddle sucked_.

* * *

><p><strong>Hello darlings! How was Christmas? I hope it was good.<strong>

**Anyway, I did my best at this chapter, but I was kind of blocked this week. As I said in the last chapter I'm excited to where this story is going, but I still need to cover some ground to get the real action started, please stay with me. **

**I don't know if you guys realised, but the peace is a little hushed and will be even more until third year starts. I think that I can begin it until the start of February and then things will get interesting, for real.**

**Also, I wanted to know if I should make a different story in for each year, or should I keep it all in one? **

**Keep in mind that the rating will change as the years passes and it'll get a lot darker, so please review and let me know what you think!**

**I hope you guys like it and that I haven't disappointed. :)**


	6. The Creation of a Troll Fighter

Tom Marvolo Riddle was frustrated. Malfoy had found only five kids born between July and August of 1980 and all of them lived with their parents at the current moment. Brandon Potter, Neville Longbottom, Wayne Hopkins, Lisa Turpin and Millicent Bulstrode. There was something missing, he was sure of it.

He was also starting his searches to find the Death's Book – it was the guide which helped the Masters of Death understand and control their powers. Regulus and Lucy would pursuit it when they accomplished to break the last curses on that tomb full of treasures he had found.

Nagini took a nap on the armchair near the fireplace and Tom sat on his desk preparing the next week's classes. There was a knock on his door and he put his book aside.

"Como in." he offered and his Horcrux entered with a sour look on her face. "Sit down."

She scanned the room and decided to sit in the armchair Nagini was occupying. The messy haired girl lifted the snake gently and with much difficulty and sat down, placing the python on her lap.

"_**I'm jealous of you right now.**_" His Horcrux murmured to the python who didn't wake up during the entire process. "_**I wish I could be sleeping**_."

"Here, you'll be reading this book." Tom informed the girl and her green and big eyes widened a bit.

"That's it?" she asked incuriously.

"Would you rather be cleaning Professor Snape's cauldrons?" he sat back on his chair. When the girl shook her head he opened his book again. "There you go. Now read."

It was a muggleborn destined book. It explained trivial things about the Magical World like when it was illegal to use magic and there was also information about some magical creature, such as goblins, merpeople, veelas, and others.

The book was very helpful to kids who grew up with muggles and didn't know about the basic things.

"Are you my father?" His Horcrux asked and he scoffed a bit due to the shock.

"I'm not." He looked in the girl's eyes and they examined him closely. Her expression, like always, didn't give nothing away.

"Are you sure?" she closed the book. "I mean, being a parselmouth is a hereditary trace and we both have dark hair. Besides, you asked for my blood to do some tests."

"I can assure you, Miss Peterson, you're not my daughter." He closed his book too.

"But we're relatives." She pointed and Riddle closed his eyes, realising he would have to explain some things to this girl. "Because, you know, we're both parselmouths."

"Actually, the motive of you being able of speaking parseltongue is due to that morning when we met." He got up and walked towards her. "Do you remember?"

He placed his hand on the lightning bolt scar on her forehead and the girl hissed in pain. Tom smiled when he felt the piece of his soul begging to be reunited to the biggest part of it.

"Stop it." She hissed and Tom chuckled, returning his hand to his side. "What the hell did you do that morning?"

"The right question, Miss Peterson, is what the hell did _you_ do?"

She stared at him as he came back to his desk, the girl squeezed her eyes slightly, as if pondering something in her mind. Tom decided to not tell her about being Master of Death now. He would wait until he knew about the book's whereabouts and had a solid plan to mould her into the perfect weapon for him to use.

"Resume your reading."

"For how long am I supposed to?" her tone was bitter and Riddle smirked at that.

"For how long I wish."

* * *

><p>"You, Peterson!" Cherry howled when Megan was about to enter the great hall to have some breakfast on Sunday.<p>

The girl rolled her eyes and wondered if the redheaded boy had some kind of a crush on her because, _seriously_, his obsession with her and her supposed evilness was getting ridiculous.

"Hey Cherry." She greeted. "Long time no see." There was a round boy behind Ron, Neville Longbottom, she realised. Neville looked kind of green and he eyed her with fear in his eyes. "How're you going, Neville?"

To the boy's credit he managed to nod his head at her to show he was aware of her presence.

"You never gave the Remembrall back to us." Ron stated and Megan grinned sweetly.

"I would gladly give it back to you." The green eyed girl put a hand in the tall boy's shoulder but he shook it off. Megan frowned, _how rude_. "But I happen to not have found out what I am forgetting, you see."

The girl took the ball off her skirt's pocket and showed the boys it was still scarlet when she touched it. Ronald advanced towards the object in her hand, ready to snitch it off her hand. Megan closed her hand quickly.

"Tut-tut." She scolded. The redheaded boy's face got an interesting shade of pink. "Let's not be rude, Ron."

"_Mucus Ad Nauseam!_" Weasley had grabbed his wand and yelled the incantation towards her, when nothing but a small amount of light-green left his wand Megan smirked, seeming very amused.

"My turn." She sang and grabbed her wand from her pocket. "_Flipendo!_" the hex hit Ron immediately in his chest and the boy flew back some foots, she pointed her wand towards Neville, then. "_Flipendo!_"

When the other boy flew back too, Megan smiled sweetly at the sight of both boys laid on the marble floor.

"What's going on here?" A stern female voice asked and the girl flinched slightly.

Minerva McGonagall was leaving the great hall when she saw the scene and helped both boys to his feet.

"We were just chatting." The girl gave her most adorable smile at the professor, who didn't seem to buy it.

"She stole Neville's Remembrall and then hexed us." Ron yelled.

"Is that true?" McGonagall's voice seemed to be higher.

"Not actually." The girl confessed. "I found the ball yesterday in the ground and kept it so I could give it to Neville personally. I was about to do it when Weasley tried to use the Curse of Bogies in me so I was just defending myself."

"Liar!" Ron yelled, but Professor McGonagall lifted her hand, shutting him up.

"Well, you can return Neville's Remembrall to him now, Miss Peterson." Megan scowled, but put the ball into the round boy's hand hesitantly. Neville seemed to be very scared of her and when their hands brushed he flinched slightly.

Megan rolled her eyes.

"Ten points from Slytherin and Gryffindor each for duelling in the corridors." Both boys groaned, but Megan didn't care at all. "Also, you'll be attending detention with Filch tomorrow after dinner."

Now Megan groaned.

She entered the great hall with a sour expression in her face and sat drastically in a spot in the bench between Tracey and Pansy and across Daphne.

"I'm going to kill that Weasel." She murmured, angrily stuffing scrambled eggs into her plate.

"What did that _Gryffindor_ do now?" Daphne said the house's name as if it was an insult.

"Well, first of all…" she told them what happened and how she now had a detention with _Filch_, from all people.

"It sucks to be you." Daphne concluded emotionless.

"Thanks."

Suddenly, a lot of owls arrived and entered the great hall. A brown one landed near Pansy as other two landed near Tracey and Daphne and extended their legs so the girls could remove the letters. Megan was used to it, the last thing Mrs Peterson would do was sending the girl a letter, let alone sending it by an owl.

But what took her by surprise was a school owl carrying a huge package landing near her. It offered Megan its leg and when the girl loosed the string in it the owl helped itself with some toast from Megan's plate.

_Use it carefully._

_-Riddle_

She read the small note and frowned, wondering what the professor had sent her and if it was safe.

"What is this?" Draco asked her and she didn't even realise he had arrived in the table.

"I don't know."

"Well, then open it."

Megan unwrapped the package and saw that it was a broom. She snorted.

"It's a Nimbus Two Thousand." Blondie informed her as he sipped some juice. "I have one of these myself. They're very good."

The next day after dinner she met with Cherry and Roundy in Hogwarts' entrance, to her surprise and amusement Brad was there as well.

"What is it, Brad? Can't be far from your soul mate for very long?" she asked the boy and the three Gryffindors groaned at the sight of her.

"Piss off, Peterson." His voice was full of hatred and anger.

Megan wondered if he was still pissed because of the punch she gave him when they were flying.

She knew he must be there because of the prank he played on Snape in their Potions class earlier that day. Brad had turned the professor's hair pink while he wasn't paying attention and the man just found out when everybody started to snicker.

It wasn't pretty when the professor almost killed the boy in anger and assigned four different essays due to next week.

Way to go, Brad.

Filch arrived and conduced them to the Trophy Room.

"I don't wanna see a dirty spot on any of these when I come back." He warned them and left to do Merlin knows what.

They started cleaning the trophies, Megan made sure to work really slowly so she could clean the less as possible.

"Look, that's my father!" Brad announced, pointing to a huge golden trophy. The girl rolled her eyes, what a daddy's boy.

She put her second clean trophy back on its shelf, it was small and she had cleaned in in twenty minutes, while the boys would do this in less than three.

Something with professor Riddle's name caught her eyes and she saw a trophy of _Special Award for Services to the School _with his name and rolled her eyes.

Megan glanced at the three boys working and talking and to her happiness none of them was paying attention to her. She sat in a dark corner, tired and sleepy, when she saw those devious yellow eyes staring at her.

"Shoo!" she tried to scare the cat away, with no success.

Mrs Norris kept looking at her without blinking.

"_Go away_." she whispered and the cat advanced towards her, giving Megan the chills.

When the demon was at her feet, the girl prepared herself to kick it. The cat looked inside her eyes and bloody _grinned_ at her. That was it, Megan flexed her leg and, with her entire strength, kicked the cat as hard as she could.

"MEOW!" the sound that left the cats mouth was loud and painful.

The boys looked from the cat to her, shocked.

"Did you just kicked Mrs Norris?" Neville asked in a whisper.

"Kind of." She mumbled, wondering what Filch would do to her if he found out what she'd done to his precious cat.

"_Wicked_." Brad whispered, grinning. But then seemed to remember he didn't like her and frowned.

When Filch came back, nobody said a word about what occurred while he was absent. The boys seemed strangely satisfied with the cat being hurt but Megan didn't comment on it.

When the girl left to her dorms, the cat accompanied her the entire path until her common room entrance, even she trying to shoo it away lots of times. She gave one last glace to the creature before entering, who sent her an evil glare in return. Megan just knew that the cat was planning her death.

_That bloody yellow-eyed demon_.

* * *

><p>Life went by without many important happenings and soon it was Halloween. Megan went to classes and her Quidditch practise. All Slytherin Students went to the great hall excited for the celebrations, but Draco and Megan decided to stay a bit longer in the common room to finish a DADA project about hags. It was quite easy for Megan, as the girl had lived her entire life with Mrs Peterson and knew a lot about the creature's habits, but she and Draco were dedicated to win the competition by the end of the year. Draco was quite good at drawing and they decided to do a draw <em>and<em> an essay about the hags.

"There you go." Blondie said as he finished his work. "I think it's good."

Megan looked at the boy's piece of art and grinned. It was very good.

"Let's get dinner, then." The green eyed girl had finished her essay some time ago and was just waiting for her partner to end his drawing. "I'm starving."

They walked lazily inside the dungeons when a horrible, putrid smell caught their nostrils.

"What the hell?" the girl murmured, covering her nose with her hand.

"It's seems it comes from something really rotten." Draco pulled his robes to cover his nose as well. "Maybe something in Snape's office has gone bad."

"It would have to be something really big."

Both eleven year old stopped walking as they heard a low grunting, and the shuffling footfalls of something that resembled gigantic feet.

Megan wondered if they should come back to the common room when they saw something monstrous.

It was a horrible sight. Twelve feet tall, its skin was a dull, granite grey, its great lumpy body like a boulder with its small bald head perched on top like a coconut. It had short legs thick as tree trunks with flat, horny feet. The smell coming from it was incredible. It was holding a huge wooden club, which dragged along the floor because its arms were so long.

"What the hell is this thing?" the girl's voice was nothing more than a whisper. She was paralysed from fear and when she looked at Malfoy she realised she was not the only one.

"I think it's a troll." He whispered back. Blondie's face was so twisted Megan thought he was going to cry or scream at any moment.

"HELP!" Malfoy screamed when the troll started to advance towards them.

"RUN!" Megan yelled and they ran as fast as they could to the opposite direction.

However, they didn't pay much attention to where they were going and ended up in a dead end, the only way of leaving the corridor was to go in the direction the troll was.

"We're going to die." Draco whimpered and Mega rolled her eyes.

"We wouldn't be in this situation if you hadn't screamed." She spat.

"Me?"

They stopped arguing when the sound of its feet became louder and they saw the troll walking towards them again, but this time they had nowhere to run to.

"Flipendo!" Megan screamed, but it didn't seem to not even tickle the monster's skin.

"Are you dumb?" Malfoy asked.

"Shut up and so something better." She ordered and examined the giant creature some feet from them. She looked to the wooden club and had an idea. "Distract it so I can use the charm Flitwick taught us in its club and drop it over the troll's head."

Malfoy looked at her like she was crazy.

"You distract it." The troll was really close now so she didn't have time to argue.

"Hey, you ugly piece of garbage!" she yelled and the thing stopped, examining her closely.

"You'll have to make him let go of it." Draco whispered with wide eyes.

Megan sighed and let a huge scream out of her mouth. The troll ran at her and smashed its club in the wall where she was, if she didn't lowered her head she would be dead and her brain spilled all over the wall.

It grabbed the girl by her neck with its free hand and – before it had the opportunity of lifting her up – Megan closed her eyes and bit the troll's wrist with all her strength. It tasted horrible and she would never get the taste out of her mouth. The beast howled in pain and dropped its club and the girl at the same time.

"Wingardium Leviosa!" To Blondie's credit he didn't think twice and spoke the incantation the moment the thing let go of the club.

The club rose and hovered over the thing's head until Draco dropped it. The troll swayed on the spot and then fell flat on its face, with a thud that made the whole corridor tremble.

Megan fell to the floor next to the troll, with a sour look in her face. Her neck hurt and her mouth tasted so badly she would throw up at any minute. Also, her heart beat so fast she thought it would fly out her mouth at any second.

"Are you okay?" Blondie asked and she nodded.

"You?"

"Yeah…" He whispered and sat down beside her. "You bit it."

Suddenly they heard heavy footsteps and looked up to see Professor Riddle, Snape and McGonagall with grimaces, looking from the collapsed troll to them.

"_Now_ you arrive." She sighed and threw up near Draco's shoes, who squealed in disgust and got up.

The taste in her mouth was even worse now.

"What on earth were you thinking of?" said Professor McGonagall, with cold fury in her voice. "You're lucky you weren't killed. Why aren't you in your dormitory?"

"Because we were going to the great hall?" Malfoy answered but it sounded more as a question.

"You didn't know there was a troll in the dungeons?" Snape asked his godson, who shook his head.

"Are you okay, Miss Peterson?" Professor Riddle asked Megan as the girl threw up one more time.

"Come, I'll take you to the Hospital Wing." Riddle offered her his hand and she took it hesitantly. "Are you unharmed, Mr Malfoy? Or do you need to get checked too?"

"I'm fine."

"I'm fine."

Both kids answered at the same time. If there was somewhere Megan didn't want to go it was the Hospital Wing.

"I just need to brush my teeth."

"Twenty points for Slytherin each for defeating a Mountain Troll." Snape offered.

"Yes, you are lucky. Not many first years are able of accomplishing such thing." McGonagall was clearly worried about them.

The three teachers talked quietly between themselves to discuss how they would get the thing out of Hogwarts. Malfoy took the opportunity to grin at her.

"We're totally wining Riddle's contest after this." Blondie seemed overconfident after the shock had passed and the teachers arrived.

"Yeah, I just wish to have my mouth clean again." She murmured and the boy chuckled. Megan glared at him, it was easy to laugh when it wasn't your mouth filled with vomit and troll's taste.

Later that night, when Megan's mouth was clean, her stomach full and the shock had faded away, she laid on her bed and revised that night's happenings. She could have been killed and yet when she remembered it she had warm and fuzzy sensations and a certain thrill in her stomach as well. It felt quite good, she felt _alive_.

* * *

><p>In November the Quidditch season had begun. Marcus Flint was obsessed with winning and had forced the entire team to train every night, which was causing Megan's hours of sleep to not be as long as she wished.<p>

The morning before the first game Megan was relatively calm. The girls had waken her earlier and they left for the great hall to grab some breakfast before the big game: Slytherin against Gryffindor.

"You can't eat all of this." Malfoy scowled, pointing at Megan's plate full of scrambled eggs and toasts.

"Yes I can." Before Hogwarts she had never been allowed to eat as much as she wanted and now that she was, she would eat.

"You're going to get fat." Pansy grimaced at the thought of being overweighed.

"No I won't. I'm scrawny, besides, I exercise." She told the girl.

"It's not that." Blondie argued. "Do you really want to fly with a full stomach?"

Megan stopped eating, seeing his point, she had to fly really fast after all. With a sad look at her half-full plate, she grabbed one last toast before raising from her seat.

"Let's go." She groaned.

Megan had entered one of the showers to change into her green uniform, as she was the only girl in the team. When she left all of the boys were dressed and Flint was starting his speech.

"Okay, men." he said.

"And woman." Megan snorted at him.

"And _Megan_." Flint smirked down at her and Lucian Bole – one of the Beaters – snickered lightly. "We're going to win this, plain and simple. We're going to show those Gryffindorks who are the bests and they will be in tears by the end of the game when we're done with them."

The boys cheered and Megan grinned, excited to finally be in a real Quidditch match.

As they walked to the field, there were loud cheers from both sides of the crowd.

"Now, I want a nice fair game, all of you." Madame Hooch sent a glare towards Flint, who just winked at Megan.

"Mount your brooms, please."

Megan clambered onto her Nimbus Two Thousand.

Madam Hooch gave a loud blast on her silver whistle.

Fifteen brooms rose up, high, high into the air. They were off.

"AAAAAAAND it starts!" Lee Jordan – a third year Gryffindor – narrated the game. "Both Gryffindor and Slytherin have first years additions this year. Brandon Potter – son of James Potter, one of the greatest Quidditch Players from our generation, and a child prodigy who is following his father's footsteps is playing as a seeker for Gryffindor!" the red and gold coloured house cheered loudly. "And in Slytherin's side we have a new seeker too. Megan Peterson – the girl everyone thought was a muggleborn in the middle of snakes just to be discovered a parselmouth and bastard daughter of Professor Riddle is-"

"JORDAN!" Professor McGonagall and Riddle yelled at the same time.

"Sorry professors, Flint is with the Quaffle..." And the boy continued to narrate as Megan rolled her eyes.

The game was relatively calm for Megan. Flint always told her to hover over them and avoid the other players until she see the snitch and that was what she was doing.

The girl avoided a Bugler sent from one of the Weasley twins that passed dangerously near her head and she suddenly saw a golden blur near Higgs' broom.

Megan didn't think twice before grasping her broom's handle firmly and pointing it to the snitch's direction, she dived quickly and had to supress her urge of letting go of a happy laugh. The air whistled in her ears and made her loose ponytail loses its hair tie, but she didn't care. The sensation was amazing and she had never felt more alive.

The girl looked around her and saw that Brad had realised she had spotted the snitch and was now following her, almost catching up with her speed. She frowned and tightened her thighs around her broom and grasped the handle harder. However, the golden snitch flew higher and, to her mortification, towards Brad.

With all her strength, Megan stopped forcefully her broom and quickly turned it back. Her movements gained some cheers from the Slytherin crowd, but she didn't pay them any attention. She was shoulder to shoulder with Brad now, and while punching the opponent was forbidden, throwing your body at them was not. So she did it, the girl collapsed her shoulder forcefully with the boy's own and took advantage of his moment of shock to stretch her arm forwards and grab the snitch.

"Foul!" the Gryffindors screamed, but Megan didn't care at all.

She had caught the snitch and won, it was all that mattered.

Hooch blew her whistle and Slytherin exploded in loud cheers.

* * *

><p>When Riddle passed up a list of the Slytherin students who would stay in Hogwarts at Christmas Megan wasn't surprised when she, Tracey and Percy Weasley were the only ones to sign up. Pansy, Daphne and even Draco had strangely asked her if she wanted to spend the holydays in their homes and Megan caught herself wondering how special being a parselmouth made you, after all.<p>

She knew that it was very appreciated by pureblood families as it was a trace Salazar Slytherin himself was known for, but she always wondered if they wanted to make acquaintances with her just because of it, or if it was due to the ridiculous rumour of her being Riddle's daughter. For what Megan knew, he was a much respected wizard.

It was strange to have the huge dorm almost to herself, but Megan wasn't complaining at all. It was a great opportunity to catch up with her sleep without being constantly interrupted. The school was empty and while most of the few students in it enjoined the holydays for doing things like staying outside and flying, Megan preferred to stay in and relax.

On Christmas Day the girl woke up with a bunch of presents near her bed. She eyed them suspiciously, never in her life getting anything on Christmas or on any day.

"What are you waiting for? Let's open it." Tracey seemed to be waiting for opening her own gifts along Megan.

The first one was a brown and thick book sent by Pansy. The tittle read _A Proper Witch's Guide _and Megan rolled her eyes. Daphne had sent her a beautiful framed mirror, while Tracey gave her lots of candy.

Blondie's gift was her favourite until then. He sent her a leather wand holster and while it was too loose on her scrawny arms it fit perfectly on her thigh. She felt truly badass with it, her skirt barely covered her wand, but it was great to know you could access it in less than a second if you needed to.

Megan felt a bit bad for not being able of repaying them, but decided to put that thought aside when a small gift caught her eyes. It was not very well wrapped in silver paper and when she opened it she faced the most beautiful piece of jewellery she had ever seen. It was a simple and delicate silver necklace, with a small snake as a pendant, in its eyes there were tiny green stones that she suspected were emeralds. It was quite amusing the way the snake's eyes matched hers.

"Wow!" Tracey seemed to have finished unwrapping her own gifts. "Who gave you this?"

Megan picked up the small card that accompanied the necklace.

_Merry Christmas_

_T.M.R._

"Professor Riddle is creepy." She mumbled.

"Maybe he's just a father who wants to present his long lost daughter?" Tracey asked, teasing.

"Go to hell."

* * *

><p>"Come on Megan! Let's go outside." Tracey whined as the green eyed girl curled in a cosy armchair near the fireplace.<p>

"Why did you stay, again?" Megan murmured, annoyed with the other girl's insistence.

"Because my parents are on a second honey moon." Tracey sighed and pouted. "Please, usually I would drag Greengrass or Parkinson but they're not here now, so it must be you."

Megan closed her book and slowly got up.

"I'm just doing this because I'm bored as well."

They left the over-decorated castle and sat under a big tree, in front of the library's windows. The floor was covered with snow and they needed to use a charm Professor Flitwick taught them – a bluish fire that never extinguished or burned – to keep them warm besides their clothes and coats.

Tracey giggle as she worked in the fabrication of a snow angel and Megan took advantage of her dorm mate's distraction to throw a snow-ball at her out of boredom.

Tracey squealed of shock and cold. It was Megan's turn to giggle.

"Oh, you think this is funny?" the brown haired girl asked with a bitter tone.

"Very much, actually." Megan's smirk fell when she received a very cold snow ball right into her face.

* * *

><p><strong>Hello! Do you remember me? Happy New Year everybody!<strong>

**So, I'm blocked. I was trying to do some fluffy for Christmas and New Year's Eve, but I just couldn't. Maybe I'll be able of doing it for the next chapter, but I preferred to not wait and post what I have already. I'm sorry if you guys are disappointed.**

**Anyway, thanks for reading and don't forget to review and let me know what you think :)**


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